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"The Momon Prophet's Tragedy" 



J ^7 






A Review of an Article by the late John Hay, 
pubHshed originally in the Atlantic Monthly for 
December, 1869, and republished in the Saints 
Herald of June 21, 1905. 



THE REVIEWER. 

ORSON F. WHITNEY 

Author of Whitney's History of Utah, and Assistant Historian of the 
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 



Salt Lake City, Utah 

THE DESERET NEWS 

1905 






LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

NOV 18 1905 

Copyrizfit Entry 

CLASS >9 XXc. No. 

COPY B. 



Copyright 1905. 

By 

O. F. WHITNEY. 



INTEODUCTORY. 



"The wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the under- 
standine: of their prudent men shall be hid." — Isaiah 29: 14, 

I have often pondered over the fulfillment of 
these prophetic words, with reference to the lofty and 
the learned and their relations to what the world 
terms '^Mormonism." Why is it that men and wo- 
men, intelligent, educated, and even profound, can- 
not see in this great social and religious phenomenon 
something more than a topic to be treated in a light 
and flippant vein, or in a spirit of harshness and in- 
tolerance! Giants in intellect as to other things, 
when they deal with the history, doctrines, aims and 
motives of the Latter-day Saints, they seem suddenly 
changed into dwarfs, mere children, as powerless to 
cope with the mighty problem as were the learned 
rabbis in the Temple with the youthful and divine 
Son of God. Especially is this the case with those 
who approach it in a captious spirit, determined to 
find fault, to attack and ridicule rather than to fairly 
investigate. They cannot analyze it, cannot even 
grasp it, and are incapable of forming any just or 
proper conclusion in relation to it. 

To those who understand the subject, even in part, 
it presents the most beautiful and most attractive 
phases. It is truly "a marvelous work and a wonder. ' ' 
Nothing in the whole wide realm of thought, in the 
universal domain of reason, science, poetry and phil- 
osophy, compares with it in sublimity and loveliness. 
Why, then, do 'Hhe wise and prudent," as they are 



INTRODUCTORY. 

called, pass it by as a thing of naught, or pause only 
long enough to smile, sneer, or cast a stick or a stone 
with a view to injuring and defacing it? To the un- 
initiated, even if fair and tolerant, there appears to 
be little in *'Mormonism'' that reasonable men and 
women should desire; at best it is but one among 
many creeds and systems with which the world is 
filled. While to those who have embraced it, and 
have partaken of its spirit, it stands alone, unique, 
all- comprehending — the sum of eternal truth, the 
glorified record of God's dealings with man in all 
dispensations. 

Why this difference? Why do not all intelligent 
minds recognize in ^^Mormonism'' what its votaries 
recognize? Are the Gentiles all philosophers, and 
the Mormons (who were once Gentiles) all fools? Is 
all wisdom outside the Church of Jesus Christ of 
Latter-day Saints? I think not. There must be a 
better explanation. What is it? 

I shall not attempt to answer the question at the 
present time; though I could do so, I believe, to the 
satisfaction of at least the Latter-day Saints. I pre- 
fer that my readers. Mormon and non-Mormon, 
should answer it for themselves. My duty here is to 
present a review of a public utterance, upon a por- 
tion of the Mormon theme, of one of the world's 
wise men, who, while possessing every advantage 
that intelligence and culture could give, failed utterly 
to recognize the truth, to comprehend the mightiest 

problem of the ages. 

Okson F. Whitney. 

Salt Lake City, October, 1905. 



*THE MORMON PROPHETS TRAGEDY." 



Under the above caption, the ''Saints' Herald," a 
paper edited and published by Joseph Smith and 
associates, at Lamoni, Iowa, and proclaiming itself 
to be the ''official publication of the Reorganized 
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," gave 
space in its issue of June 21, 1905, to the reproduc- 
tion of an article purporting to be an account of 
events leading up to and culminating in the murder 
of the Prophet and the Patriarch, Joseph and Hyrum 
Smith, at Carthage, Illinois, June 27, 1844. The 
article was written by Colonel John Hay, American 
poet and statesman, many years before he became 
Secretary of State, though not before he had risen to 
prominence in the field of diplomacy. 

Had not the Lamoni publishers seen fit to re- 
print this rather ancient piece of literature, the sub- 
joined review of it probably would never have ap- 
peared. They doubtless thought that the so-called 
"Tragedy" would make good and appropriate read- 
ing for the anniversary month of the Prophet's mar- 
tyrdom. Their only comment in connection with it 
is this brief introduction: "The 'Atlantic Monthly' 
for December, 1869, published the following article 
from the pen of John Hay, now Secretary of State, 
Washington. As an account from the standpoint 



6 **THE MORMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY.'' 

of a non-member, it will be of interest to our read- 
ers." 

The wisdom of resurrecting such a mass of 
misstatements, written in a spirit of rank prejudice, 
flippant in style, heartless in tone, and worthy only 
of the oblivion to which the sure years had consigned 
them, might well be questioned; but I do not care to 
dwell upon that point at this time. The responsibility 
must rest where it belongs. Wisdom was never a 
characteristic of those bent upon popularizing the 
truth by emasculating it. The duty devolving upon 
the present writer is to point oat the errors which the 
article contains, and counteract so far as can now be 
done, the ill effects of their dissemination. This is 
the purpose, rather than to find fault with the La- 
moni editors, or with the eminent scholar and states- 
man who has now passed to his final account. 

The sudden death of Secretary Hay, only ten 
days after the issuance of that particular imprint of 
the paper in question, was of course unforeseen by 
the publishers ; nor is it desh^ed that the event should 
cut any figure in the case as presented by this re- 
view. I would much rather Mr. Hay were alive than 
dead. Our country needs the services of such men 
as he, one of the wisest of her diplomats, one of the 
ablest of her civic servants. I am sorry that he 
could not have perused the contents of this pam- 
phlet. He might have profited thereby. Possibly 
it would have induced him to revise himself, if in- 
deed he had not done so already. I cannot resist 
the impression that John Hay, Secretary of State, 



"the mormon peophet's teagedy." 7 

would not have written the article penned by John 
Hay, politician and journalist. Men grow some in 
thirty- six years, and this man grew remarkably dur- 
ing his last two decades. Had he produced his 
"Tragedy" in 1905, instead of 1869, I doubt that he 
would have made himself an apologist for mobs 
and murder; that he would have treated in a 
lightsome, humorous vein, a theme so serious, so 
essentially solemn and awful, as the killing of inno- 
cent men, revered by hundreds of thousands of his 
fellow citizens as veritable prophets of God. It was 
altogether unworthy of a great man, or of one who 
wished to be considered fair and impartial. 

In the hope that it may assist the great men of 
our land now living, or v/ho may yet live, as well as 
the public at large, to a better understanding of the 
subject than was possessed by Mr. Hay when he 
wrote "The Mormon Prophet's Tragedy,'' this an- 
swer is indited and sent forth. May the Spirit of 
Truth prepare the way for its acceptance by the 
honest in heart ! 



"old joe smith." 



The first thing in the article under review that 
strikes the reader unpleasantly, is the flippant, al- 
most jocular mood in which it is written; a feature 
foreign to the true spirit of history (to say nothing of 
poesy) , and quite unbecoming a Christian scholar in 
the treatment of a tragic theme. At the very open- 



8 '*THE MOKMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY.'' 

ing of the satirical onslaught, the woiild-be funny 
author refers to his subject as *'the prophet Joe 
Smith/' and then proceeds to ridicule him, and to 
blacken his character in advance of the main narra- 
tive; the evident purpose being to prejudice the pub- 
lic mind against the founder of **Mormonism," with 
a view to palliating if not justifying *'the deep 
damnation of his taking off." 

The contemptuous nicknaming of the Prophet, 
if excusable at all, must be upon the ground that it 
was common among politicians of that period to ab- 
breviate the given names of men, even the most emi- 
nent; a practice not yet obsolete, though only in 
favor with the vulgar. Thus we have such familiar 
titles as "Abe" Lincoln, "Steve" Douglass, et al.^ 
in the political nomenclature of the State of Illinois. 
But I submit that it would have been in better taste 
for a scholarly writer, a Christian gentleman, one 
who would hardly have tolerated such a disrespect- 
ful allusion to the murdered President Lincoln, and 
might even have felt nettled had he himself been re- 
ferred to as "Jack" Hay, to have refrained from 
this exhibition of discourtesy to the dead, this 
all but ribald reference to one regarded by a 
great and growing people as a prophet and a martyr 
to a sacred cause. 

True, such nicknames are not always used ill 
naturedly. In the backwoods they might indicate a 
sort of rude affection for the persons to whom they 
are given. But it is not so in this instance, and 
even if it were, it would still be an impropriety. It may 



li 



THE MOKMON PROPHET's TKAGEDY.'^ 



be said, however, in further extenuation of this breach 
of literary etiquette and Christian charity, that the 
sectarian churches, almost from the beginning of 
Mormon history, had stigmatized the youthful revela- 
torof the unpopular religion, as '^OldJoe Smith;'' and 
as Mr Hay was reared among such influences it is not 
surprising that he should have adopted the prevailing 
mode and incorporated the epithet into his religious 
and political creed. 

Joseph Smith himself once reproved a Methodist 
minister for neglecting to observe the amenities to- 
ward him in this respect. The incident is related by 
Josiah Quincy, who was a guest of the Prophet at 
his home in Nauvoo, only a few weeks before the 
martyrdom. The reverend gentleman, who was also 
visiting the City of the Saints, had remarked, ''Why, 
I told my congregation the other Sunday that they 
might as well believe Joe Smith as such theology 
as that!" ''Did you say Joe Smith in a ser- 
mon?" inquired the person to whom the title had 
been applied. "Of course I did. Why noti" Says 
Mr. Quincy, "the Prophet's reply was given with a 
quiet superiority that was overwhelming: 'Consider- 
ing only the day and the place, it would have been 
more respectful to have said Lieutenant-General Jos- 
eph Smith.' Clearly the worthy minister was no 
match for the head of the Mormon Church." 



THE "tragedy" opens. 



(( 



Now let us see what Mr. Hay has to present. 
As early as 1838, ",j he '^writes, "the prophet Joe 



10 '*THE MORMON PEOPHET's TKAGEDY.'^ 

Smith seems to have adopted that fascmating theory 
Hhat all pretty women have the right to charm us, 
and the wife's claim of mere priority should not in- 
jure the just pretensions of others to our admira- 
tion.' Joseph, never read Moliere, — nor anybody 
else, — and so he did not copy either the language or 
manner of the irresistible Signor Tenorio. His lov- 
er's mood was ^more condoling', but not less effect- 
ive for the flavor of cant there was in it. His weap- 
ons were direct revelations and promises of mansions 
in the sky. His wooing prospered in spite of the 
buxom and protesting Emma, his lawful wife, who 
exhibited a natural though purely eclectic scepticism 
in regard to those special revelations." 

And with this precious piece of scandal for a 
prelude, the "Tragedy" opens. Then follows an 
equally showy and even more defamatory declara- 
tion : 

"In the spring of 1844, in Nauvoo, the prophet 
saw the wife of Doctor Foster, admired her, and, led 
by his evil genius, marched to conquest and found 
defeat. Her reception of him was what Jomini 
would call 'defensive, with offensive return.' She 
supplemented Lucretia with Xantippe, and her hus- 
band, the doctor, found that something must be 
done. He talked the thing over with Mr. Law, whose 
placens uxor"^ had received and declined the same 
saintly overtures, and they came to the eminently 



* Good wife. (The footnotes herein are no part of the original 
article.) 



*^THE MORMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY." 11 

American conclusion that the light should be turned 
upon such an iniquity. They bought press and 
types, and appealed to that court of final resort for 
all Anglo-Saxon blood, — printer's ink." 

Allusion is here raade to the founding of the 
paper called the ^'Nauvoo Expositor," concerning 
which and the other matters mentioned in this some- 
what pedantic presentation, more will be said here- 
after. 

A BLUNTED ARROW. 

The would-be- witty dart that ** Joseph never 
read Moliere,— nor anybody else," falls to the ground 
from a shield of well known facts covering the ob- 
ject of this cynical attack. I am in a position to 
inform the uninformed — of which class our cultured 
author seems to have been a most conspicuous ex- 
ample so far as Mormon subjects are concerned 
— that Joseph Smith, although he had begun his 
career, like other great Americans, an illiterate 
bo}^, was nevertheless a lover of learning, and as a 
man had become a founder of schools in Ohio, in 
Missouri, and in Illinois. He had read much, and 
was well versed in history, theology, languages, law, 
and even poetry. He was likewise a patron of the 
drama, and though he may never have ''read Mo- 
liere," it was not because he was unwilling to read, 
but because he had healthier literature with which to 
store his mind. ''Seek ye out of the best books 
words of wisdom; seek learning even by study and 
also by faith," was the Prophet's y? junction to his 



12 **THE MOEMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 

people. He taught that ^Hhe glory of God is intelli- 
gence;" that **a man is saved no faster than he gets 
knowledge;" and that those who attain to most 
intelligence in this life will have just that much the ad- 
vantage in the world to come. Joseph Smith was a 
thorough scriptorian; he knew the Bible from begin- 
ning to end, and profited by his reading of it. He 
was naturally merciful and magnanimous, and did 
not bear false witness against his neighbor. Colonel 
Hay thus continues: 

''liars and hypocrites." 

"Mr. Hepworth Dixon, who has the convenient 
faculty of believing everything that is picturesque, 
and rejecting unmanageable evidence with an airy 
tant pis pour les faits,"^ represents the system of po- 
lygamy as an emanation of the political genius of 
Brigham Young, invented as a means of government, 
and accepted with blind faith by the pure-minded 
elders of Utah. He says: 'Who shall say they are 
insincere? Young told me that in the early days of 
this strange institution he was much opposed to 
plural households, and I am confident that he speaks 
the truth. Among the Mormon presidents and apos- 
tles, we have not seen one face on which liar and 
hypocrite were written. Though we daily meet with 
fanatics, we have not seen a single man whom we 
can call a rogue.' It is inconsistent with Mr. Dix- 
on's theory of Smith's mystic fanaticism to admit 



* So much the worse for the f^cts, 



'^THE^ MORMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY.'' 13 

the stories of his robust profligacy. So he simply 
denies them. But no fact is more notorious than that 
Smith's daily life had established polygamy in Nauvoo 
long before Rigdon had invented his jargon of spir- 
itual wives, or Hiram received his revelation to jus- 
tify it. The elders of the Church, Brigham and 
others, clamored rebelliously against the prophet's 
exclusive license, and together they began cautiously 
to lay the foundation of the new doctrine, which, 
properly arranged, should prove a strength in- 
stead of weakness to the Church. Begging Mr. 
Dixon's pardon, — they were 4iars and hypocrites. ' In 
the great hierarchy at Nauvoo there were no fanatics ; 
the flocks were sheep, but the keepers were wolves. 
This doctrine of spiritual wives was the result, not 
the cause, of the lewd lives of Smith, Young and 
their fellow blackguards, and was invented to justify 
the immoralities which the ignorance and credulity 
of their female worshipers rendered so easy, to 
serve in the future as a bait for the rascal few, and 
to blind the eyes of the honest and stupid mass." 

Begging nobody 's pardon,! denounce as wickedly 
and totally false what is here said of Joseph Smith, 
Brigham Young and their associates. Happily for 
some men — thanks to ^'Mormonism," which they 
so hate and villify — there is a chance for repent- 
ance beyond the grave. The only thing that 
saves the author of ''The Mormon Prophet's 
Tragedy" from the full condemnation to be vis- 
ited upon those who ''love and make a lie," 
is the fact that this particular lie was made 



14 ''the mormon prophet ^s tragedy.*' 

long before he uttered it. He had no personal 
knowledge of the matter. He was imposed upon by 
second-hand dealers in falsehoods manufactured by 
such foul and corrupt characters as John C. Bennett, 
who, in May, 1842, was expelled from the Mormon 
Church for his adulteries and rascalities. John Hay 
repeats John C. Bennett's falsehoods, and those of 
others almost equally untrustworthy. Let him answer 
at the Judgment Seat whether he repeated them be- 
cause he loved them. A man who could deliberately, 
upon such testimony, defame the good and great, 
brand them as "liars and hypocrites," and in the 
same breath refer to their red-handed murderers as 
''good citizens, educated and irreproachable," living 
to "enjoy the respect and esteem of all who know 
them," will have something to answer for at the 
righteous tribunal of a just God. 

In reply to his reply to Hep worth Dixon, 
who visited Brigham Young in Utah, and mingled 
freely with the Mormon leaders and their follow- 
ers, not contenting himself with the malicious tales 
told by their religious and political enemies, I have 
simply this to say: '* Liars and hypocrites" do 
not lay down their lives, as did Joseph and Hy- 
rum Smith, for their convictions; "profligates," ro- 
bust or otherwise, do not make the sacrifices made 
by Brigham Young and his fellow pilgrims into a 
savage wilderness, a desert transformed into an 
Eden by their moral and frugal industry. The Mor- 
mon leaders, no less than the Mormon people, 
have proved beyond all cavil, to every honest and 



*'tHE'^ MORMON prophet's TRAGEDY." 15 

unprejudiced mind, their absolute sincerity. They 
may have had their faults, but these were fewer and 
far less serious than those of their calumniators. They 
never slandered the dead, never justified the murder 
of the innocent. Joseph Smith was not of that self- 
seeking, calculating class who pander to the passions 
of the mob. He bra^ved public opinion, stemming 
the stiff current of prejudice, and never drifting with 
the tide. 

"Count me o'er earth's chosen heroes, — 

They were souls who stood alone, 
While the men they agonized for, 

Hurled the contumelious stone; 
Stood serene, and down the future 

Saw the golden beam incline 
To the side of perfect justice. 

Mastered by their faith divine, 
By one man's plain truth to manhood 

And to God's supreme design." 

HOW JOSEPH SMITH IMPRESSED MEN. 

Hepworth Dixon was not the only fair-minded 
Grentile who saw something to commend in the Mor- 
mon people and their leaders. Here are a few un- 
solicited testimonials, selected from many of the 
same sort, which show how Joseph Smith impressed 
honest men with whom he came in contact. 

A member of Congress, after meeting him in the 
City of Washington, whither he went in 1839, to petition 
the general government for redress of grievances grow- 
ing out of the wrongs suffered by him and his peo- 
ple in Missouri, wrote thus respecting the Prophet: 



16 "the mormon prophet's tragedy/' 

"Everything he says is said in a manner to leave 
an impression that he is sincere. There is no levity, 
no fanaticism, no want of dignity in his deportment. 
He is apparently from forty to forty-five years of 
age [Joseph was then about thirty-four], rather 
above middle stature, and what the ladies would call 
a very good-looking man. In his garb there are no 
peculiarities, his dress being that of a plain, unpre- 
tending citizen. He is by profession a farmer, but 
is evidently well read. * * * Throughout his 
whole address he displayed strongly a spirit of char- 
ity and forbearance." 

Joseph Smith was a free mason, and the Masonic 
Grand Master, in Illinois, wrote of him to the 
"Advocate" as follows: 

"Having recently had occasion to visit the City 
of Nauvoo, I cannot permit the opportunity to pass 
without expressing the agreeable disappointment that 
awaited me there. I had supposed, from what I had 
previously heard, that I should witness an impover- 
ished, ignorant and bigoted population, completely 
priest-ridden and tyrannized over by Joseph Smith, 
the great prophet of these people. 

"On the contrary, to my surprise, I saw a peo- 
ple apparently happy, prosperous and intelligent. 
Every man appeared to be employed in some busi- 
ness or occupation. I saw no idleness, no intemper- 
ance, no noise, no riot; all appeared to be contented, 
with no desire to trouble themselves with anything 
except their own affairs. With the religion of this 
people I have nothing to do ; if they can be satisfied 



^*THE MOKMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY." 17 

with the doctrmes of their new revelation, they have 
a right to be so. The constitution of the country 
guarantees to them the right of worshiping God ac- 
cording to the dictates of their own conscience, and 
if they can be so easily satisfied, why should we, who 
differ with them, complain? * * * * 

^'Duiingmy stay of three days I became well 
acquainted with their principal men, and more par- 
ticularly with their Prophet. I found them hospit- 
able, polite, well-informed and liberal. With Joseph 
Smith, the hospitality of whose house I kindly re- 
ceived, I was well pleased. Of cour.,e, on the sub- 
ject of religion we widely differed, but he appeared 
to be quite as willing to permit me to enjoy my right 
of opinion as I think we all ought to be to let the 
Mormons enjoy theirs. But instead of the ignorant 
and tyrannical upstart, judge my surprise at finding 
him a sensible, in'eiligent companion and gentle- 
manly man. In frequent conversations with him he 
gave me every information that I desired, and ap- 
peared to be only pleased at beirg able to do so. He 
appears to be much respected by all the people about 
him, and has their entire confidence." 

A Methodist preacher named Prior, who visited 
Nauvoo to hear a Sabbath sermon by th@ Prophet, 
recorded the result in these words: 

'*I will not attempt to describe the various feel- 
ings of my bosom as I took my seat in a conspicu- 
ous place in the congregation, who were waiting in 
breathless silence for his appearance. While he tar- 
ried, I had plenty of time to revolve in my mind the 



18 **THE MOKMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY." 

character and common report of that truly singular 
personage. I fancied that I should behold a count- 
enance sad and sorrowful, yet containing the fiery 
marks of rage and exasperation. I supposed that I 
should be enabled to discover in him some of those 
thoughtful and reserved features, those mystic and 
sarcastic glances, which I had fancied the ancient 
sages to possess. I expected to see that fearful, 
faltering look of conscious shame which, from what I 
had heard of him, he might be expected to evince. 
He appeared at last; but how was I disappointed 
when, instead of the heads and horns of the beast 
and false prophet, I beheld only the appearance of a 
common man, of tolerably large proportions. I was 
sadly disappointed, and thought that although his 
appearance could not be wrested to indicate anything 
against him, yet he would manifest all I had heard 
of him, when he began to preach. I sat uneasily, 
and watched him closely. He commenced preach- 
ing, not from the Book of Mormon, however, but 
from the Bible ; the first chapter of the first of Peter 
was his text. He commenced calmly, and continued 
dispassionately to pursue his subject, while I sat in 
breathless silence, waiting to hear that foul aspersion 
of the other sects, that diabolical disposition of re- 
venge, and to hear that rancorous denunciation of 
every individual but a Mormon. I waited in vain; 1 
listened with surprise ; I sat uneasy in my seat, and 
could hardly persuade myself but that he had been 
apprised of my presence, and so ordered his dis- 
course on my account, that I might not be able to 



*'the mormon prophet's tragedy." 19 

find fault with it; for instead of a jumbled jargon of 
half-connected sentences, and a volley of impreca- 
tions, and diabolical and malignant denunciations, 
heaped upon the heads of all who differed from him, 
and the dreadful twisting and wresting of the Scrip- 
tures to suit his own particular views, and attempt 
to weave a web of dark and mystic sophistry around 
the gospel truths, which I had anticipated, he glided 
along through a very interesting and elaborate dis- 
course, with all the care and happy facility of one 
who was well aware of his important station, and his 
duty to God and man." 

An English traveler, who visited Nauvoo in 
1843, had this to say in the course of a newspaper 
letter widely copied at the time: 

''Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet, is a sing- 
ular character; he lives at the 'Nauvoo Mansion 
House,' which is, I understand, intended to become 
a home for the stranger and traveler, and I think, 
from my own personal observation, that it will be 
deserving of the name. The Prophet is a kind, 
cheerful, sociable companion. I believe that he has 
the good- will of the community at large, and that he 
is ever ready to stand by and defend them in any 
extremity; and as I saw the Prophet and his brother 
Hyrum conversing together one day, I thought I be- 
held two of the greatest men of the nineteenth cen- 
tury. I have witnessed the Mormons in their assem- 
blies on a Sunday, and I know not where a similar 
scene could be effected or produced. With respect 
to the teachings of the Pi'ophet, I must say that there 



20 ^'the mokmon peophet's tkaged\. 



JJ 



are some things hard to be understood: but he invar- 
iably supports himself from our good old Bible. 
Peace and harmony reign in the city. The drunkard 
is scarcely ever seen, as in other cities, neither does 
the awful imprecation or profane oath strike upon 
your ear, but, while all is storm and tempest and 
confusion abroad respecting the Mormons, all is 
peace and harmony at home." 

But John Hay saw nothing of this. A mere 
child when the Prophet was murdered, he was still 
but an urchin when the Mormon community, ex- 
pelled from Illinois, made its enforced pilgrimage 
to the Eocky Mountains. True, he once lived at 
Warsaw, from wLich town the mob went forth that 
murdered the helpless prisoners in Carthage jail; 
but he was then le^s than six years old, having been 
born October 8, 1838, at Salem, Indiana. All 
that he kuew about the Mormons, or cared to re- 
member and reproduce concerning them, were the 
stories told or written by their enemies. As a youth 
he studied law at Springfield, the capital of Illinois, 
and it was there, in all probability, that he formed 
the acquaintance of Abraham Lincoln, the future 
President, whose private secretary he became during 
the period of the Civil War. A pity he could not have 
imbibed, through close association with that great 
man, some of his innate charity. Lincoln was never 
unfriendly to the Mormons, nor to any other people. 

It is plainly apparent that Mr. Hay, when he 
prepared his article for the "Atlantic Monthly," had 
little or no use for the records in the case, except 



u 



THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 21- 



such as were unfavorable to the objects of his criticism, 
and some of those he failed to interpret aright. He has 
scarcely a sentence that does not contain some inac- 
curacy. His prejudice against everything Mormon, 
and his sympathy with everything anti- Mormon, 
makes him a most unreliable historian. The article 
was intended to be '^ell- written;" one need not read 
two lines of it in order to feel that the author's mind 
was less upon what he was saying than upon how he 
was saying it ; a practice as fatal in literature as in 
oratory. Well written it might have been, — Mr. Hay 
wielded a master pen, — had he chosen a more appro- 
priate theme upon which to vent his ill-timed satire. 
While perfectly familiar with the spirit and tac- 
tics of those who deem it their mission to destroy or 
injure Mormonism; well acquainted as I am with 
their stock arguments, and with the blunders that 
they commonly commit, I must confess to my 
surprise, almost wonderment, at the following state- 
ment made by Mr. Hay in the course of his answer to 
Hepworth Dixon: 

POLYGAMY, OR THE " SPIRITUAL WIFE" DOCTRINE. 

^' No fact is more notorious than that Smith's 
daily life had established polygamy in Nauvoo long 
before Rigdon had invented his jargon of spiritual 
wives, or Hiram received his revelation to justify 
it. * * * In all Smith's curious history there is 
no fact more clearly established than this effort to 
legalize and consecrate his immoral life. It formed 



22 *'the mormon prophet's tragedy." 

the first link of that chain of circumstances which 
within a few days dragged liim to his doom." 

And nowhere, Mr. Hay, in all your curious com- 
ment upon that history, is your ignorance of Mor- 
monism and the Mormons more clearly shown.. Not 
content with taking the untenable ground that the 
doctrine of plural marriage —"the jargon of spiritual 
wives" — was introduced into the Church to conse- 
crate the immoralities of its leaders, you make the 
astounding assertion that Sidney Rigdon invented 
it, and that Hyrum Smith received the revelation to 
justify it. All of which is stupidly and ridiculously 
false. The revelation on plural marriage came 
through the Prophet, Seer and Revelator at the 
head of the Church — Joseph Smith, Jr., the original 
teacher of this doctrine. Sidney Rigdon had 
nothing to do with it, any more than he had to do 
with the origin of the Book of Mormon, which he 
was accused of writing, but in reality never saw 
until six months after its publication. Moreover, 
he was one of the recalcitrants who refused to re- 
ceive the plural- wife doctrine. How dare anyone 
having the least regard for his literary or historical 
reputation be so reckless as to assert that Sidney Rig- 
don was the author of it? 

Let some friend of Mr. Hay's answer, if he can, 
the following statement by Sidney Rigdon himself, 
contained in a communication to the ''Messenger 
and Advocate," published at Greencastle, Pennsyl- 
vania, in June, 1846. Speaking of the exiled Mor- 
mons, who were then on the Iowa frontier, moving 



u 



THE MORMON PROPHEt's TRAGEDY.'' 23 



westward under the leadership of President Brigham 
Young, Mr. Higdon says: 

*'We are well aware that the leaders of this 
people introduced many corruptions among them. 

* * * They introduced a base system of polyg- 
amy. * * * This system of corruption brought 
a train of evils with it, which has terminated in their 
entire ruin. * * * This system was introduced 
by the Smiths some time before their death, and was 
the thing which put them into the power of their 
enemies, and was the immediate cause of their death. 

* * * We warned Joseph Smith and his family 
of the ruin that was coming on them, and of the cer- 
tain destruction which awaited them for their in- 
iquity. * * * From them we received like treat- 
ment as we did from the Twelve and their followers. 

* * * The Smiths have fallen before their ene- 
enemies, as the Lord said they would, and their 
families are sunk into everlasting shame and dis- 
grace, until their very name is a reproach; and must 
remain so for ever." 

Does this sound as if Sidney Rigdom was in 
sympathy with plural marriage; that he was the * 'in- 
ventor" of the ^* jargon of spiritual wives?" 

Equally preposterous is the assertion that Hy- 
rum Smith received the revelation justifying the 
practice of plural marriage. Every boy in Utah 
knows that it was Joseph Smith, not Hyrum Smith, 
nor any other of the Prophet's subordinates, who 
claimed to have received from God the revelation 
justifying, or rather, authorizing that practice. Every 



24 ^^THE MORMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY. 



fi 



tyro in the study of Mormonism knows this to be the 
channel through which it would have to come in order 
to commend it to the Latter-day Saints as a divine 
revelation. So sacredly guarded is the right to re- 
ceive revelations for the guidance of the Church, that 
only one man upon the earth, at a time, is recognized 
as holding the keys of such communications. That 
man, at the time of which I write, was Joseph Smith, 
not Hyrum Smith, not Sidney Rigdon, nor any other 
person. But John Hay, blinded by prejudice or mis- 
led by false information, attempts to account for 
polygamy in his own way. 

"In the year 184 i," he says, "the attempt was 
made to ingraft this abomination upon the creed of 
the Church. The affidavits of William Law and 
his wife and of Austin Cowles, published in the 
^Expositor,' established the fact that Hiram Smith 
had read to them a pretended revelation of the 
dogma of "a plurality of wives," and * * * 
in the case of Sister Law, the revelation was 
strengthened by the assurances of damnation to any 
woman who objected to her husband's embracing 
the new doctrine. 

"It is true that Joe Smith, after the publication 
of these affidavits, took fright at the storm of disgust 
they produced, and desisted from the attempt to in- 
culcate the new doctrine. But he never distinctly 
denied the authenticity of the revelation. On the 
contrary, during one of those singular trials in his 
own municipal court, he stated squarely, * Brother 



''the mormon prophet's tragedy." 25 

Hiram is a prophet of the Lord ; and when the Lord 
speaks let the earth tremble,' '' 

Let me lead our author out of the maze in which 
he is wandering, and put the reader in possession of 
the facts. The revelation read by Hyrum Smith to 
William Law and Austin Cowles, and referred to in 
their affidavits printed in the ' 'Expositor," was the 
revelation received and originally uttered by Joseph 
Smith, commanding him and those to whom he 
should communicate the principle of plural marriage 
to practice it under penalty of damnation. This 
reading of the document took place in the pres- 
ence of the High Council, of which body Austin 
Cowles was a member ; William Law being at the same 
time one of the First Presidency of the Church. The 
inference drawn by Mr. Hay that the revelation had 
been '^received" by Hyrum Smith, that he was the 
source or original oracle of the same, is not warranted 
even by the wording of the affidavits he cites. It is 
simply a jumped-at conclusion — purely an invention 
of his own. As to what the revelation contained, there 
need be no quibble. Let it speak for itself. Here it 
is in extenso: 

SECTION 132, DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS. 

Eevelation on the Eternity of the Marriage Covenant, including 
Plurality of Wives. Given through Joseph the Seer, in Nau- 
voo, Hancock County, Illinois, July 12th, 1843. 

1. Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, my servant Joseph, 
that inasmuch as you have inquired of my hand, to know and un- 
derstand wherein I, the Lord, justified my servants Abraham, 



26 ''the mormon prophet's tragedy. 



M 



Isaac and Jacob; as also Moses, David and Solomon, nly servants, 
as touching the principle and doctrine of their having many wives 
and concubines: 

2. Behold! and lo, I am the Lord thy God, and will answer 
thee as touching this matter: 

3. Therefore, prepare thy heart to receive and obey the in- 
structions which I am about to give unto you; for all those who 
have this law revealed unto them must obey the same; 

4. For behold! I reveal unto you a new and an everlasting 
covenant; and if ye abide not that covenant, then are ye damned; 
for no one can reject this covenant, and be permitted to enter into 
my glory; 

5. For all who will have a blessing at my hands, shall abide 
the law which was appointed for that blessing, and the conditions 
thereof, as were instituted from before the foundation of the 
world : 

6. And as pertaining to the new and everlasting covenant, 
it was instituted for the fullness of my glory; and he that receiv- 
eth a fullness thereof, must and shall abide the law, or he shall 
be damned, saith the Lord God. 

7. And verily I say unto you, that the conditions of this law 
are these: All covenants, contracts, bonds, obligations, oaths, 
vows, performances, connections, associations, or expectations, 
that are not made, and entered into, and sealed by the Holy Spirit 
of promise, of him who is anointed, both as well for time and for 
all eternity, and that too most holy, by revelation and command- 
ment through the medium of mine anointed, whom I have ap- 
pointed on the earth to hold this power, (and I have appointed 
unto my servant Joseph to hold this power in the last days, and 
there is never but one on the earth at a time, on whom this power 
and the keys of this Priesthood are conferred,) are of no efficacy, 
virtue or force, in and after the resurrection from the dead; for 
all contracts that are not made unto this end, have an end when 
men are dead. 

8. Behold! mine house is a house of order, saith the Lord 
God, and not a house of confusion. 



Ur 



THE MORMON PROPHEX's TRAGEDY." 27 

9. Will I accept of an offering, saith the Lord, that is not 
made in my name ! 

10. Or, will I receive at your hands that which I have not ap- 
pointed! 

11. And will I appoint unto you, saith the Lord, except it 
be by law, even as I and my Father ordained unto you, before the 
world was! 

12. I am the Lord thy God, and I give unto you this com- 
mandment, that no man shall come unto the Father but by me, 
or by my word, which is my law, saith the Lord; 

13. And everything that is in the world, whether it be 
ordained of men, by thrones, or principalities, or powers, or things 
of name, whatsoever they may be, that are not by me, or by my 
word, saith the Lord, shall be thrown down, and shall not remain 
after men are dead, neither in nor after the resurrection, saith the 
Lord your God; 

14. For whatsoever things remain, are by me; and whatsoever 
thing are not by me, shall be shaken and destroyed. 

15. Therefore, if a man marry him a wife in the world, and 
he marry her not by me, nor by my word; and he covenant with 
her so long as he is in the world, and she with him, their coven- 
ant and marriage are not of force when they are dead, and when 
they are out of the world; therefore, they are not bound by any 
law when they are out of the world. 

16. Therefore, when they are out of the world, they neither 
marry, nor are given in marriage; but are appointed angels in 
heaven, which angels are ministeiing servants, to minister for 
those who are worthy of a far more, and an exceeding, and an 
eternal weight of glory; 

17. For these angels did not abide my law, therefore they 
cannot be enlarged, but remain separately and singly, without 
exaltation, in their saved condition, to all eternity, and from 
henceforth are not gods, but are angels of God, for ever and 
ever. 

18. And again, verily I say unto you, if a man marry a wife, 
and make a covenant with her for time and for all eternity, if 
that covenant is not by me, or by my word, which is my law, 



28 *^THE MOEMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY.^' 

and is not sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise, through him whom 
I have anointed and appointed unto this power — then it is not 
valid, neither of force when they are out of the world, because 
they are not joined by me, saith the Lord, neither by my word; 
when they are out of the world, it cannot be received there, be- 
cause the angels and the Gods are appointed there, by whom 
they cannot pass; they cannot, therefore, inherit my glory, for 
my house is a house of order, saith the Lord God. 

19. And again, verily I say unto you, if a man marry a wife 
by my word, which is my law, and by the new and everlasting 
covenant, and it is sealed unto them by the Holy Spirit of prom- 
ise, by him who is anointed, unto whom I have appointed this 
power, and the keys of this Priesthood; and it shall be said unto 
them, ye shall come forth in the first resurrection; and if it be after 
the first resurrection, in the next resurrection; and shall inherit 
thrones, kingdoms, principalities, and powers, dominions, all 
heights and depths — then shall it be written in the Lamb's Book 
of Life, that he shall commit no murder whereby to shed inno- 
cent blood, and if ye abide in my covenant, and commit no mur- 
der whereby to shed innocent blood, it shall be done unto them 
in all things whatsoever my servant hath put upon them, in 
time, and through all eternity, and shall be of full force when 
they are out of the world; and they shall pass by the angels, and 
the Gods, which are set there, to their exaltation and glory in 
all things, as hath been sealed upon their heads, which glory 
shall be a fullness and a continuation of the seeds for ever and 
ever. 

20. Then shall they be Gods, because they have no end; 
therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because 
they continue; then shall they be above all, because all things 
are subject unto them. Then shall they be Gods, because they 
have all power, and the angels are subject unto them. 

21. Verily verily, I say unto you, except ye abide my law, 
ye cannot attain to this glory. 

22. For strait is the gate and narrow the way that leadeth 
unto the exaltation and continuation of the lives, and few there 



**THE MORMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY." 29 

be that find it, because ye receive me not in the world, neither 
do ye know me. 

23. But if ye receive me in the world, then shall ye know 
me, and shall receive your exaltation, that where I am, ye shall 
be also, 

24. This is eternal lives, to know the only wise and true God, 
and Jesus Christ, whom he hath sent. I am he. Receive ye, 
therefore, my law. 

25. Broad is the gate, and wide the way that leadeth to the 
deaths, and many there are that go in thereat; because they re- 
ceive me not, neither do they abide in my law. 

26. Verily, verily I say unto you, if a man marry a wife ac- 
cording to my word, and they are sealed by the Holy Spirit of 
promise, accoiding to mine appointment, and he or she shall 
commit any sin or transgression of the new and everlasting cov- 
enant whatever, and all manner of blasphemies, and if they com- 
mit no murder, wherein they shed innocent blood — yet they shall 
come forth in the first resurrection, and enter into their exaltation; 
but they shall be destroyed in the flesh, and shall be delivered 
unto the buffetings of Satan unto the day of redemption, saith 
the Lord God. 

27. The blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, which shall not 
be forgiven in the world nor out of the world, is in that ye com- 
mit murder, wherein ye shed innocent blood, and assent unto my 
death, after ye have received my new and everlasting covenant, 
saith the Lord God; and he that abideth not this law, can in no 
wise enter into my glory, but shall be damned, saith the Lord. 

28. I am the Lord thy God, and will give unto thee the law 
of my Holy Priesthood, as was ordained by me and my Father, 
before the world was. 

29. Abraham received all things, whatsoever he received, 
by revelation and commandment, by my word, sailh the Lord, 
and hath entered into his exaltation, and sitteth upon his throne. 

30. Abraham received promises concerning his seed, and of 
the fruit of his loins, — from whose loins ye are, namely, my ser- 
vant Joseph,— which were to continue so long as they were in the 
world; and as touching Abraham and his seed, out of the world 



30 '*THE MORMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY." 

they should contiuue; both in the world and out of the world 
should they continue as innumerable as the stars; or, if ye were 
to count the sand upon the sea shore^ ye could not number them. 

31. This promise is yours also, because ye are of Abraham, 
and the promise was made unto Abraham; and by this law are 
the continuation of the works of my Father, wherein he glorifieth 
himself. 

32. Go ye, therefore, and do the works of Abraham; enter ye 
into my law, and ye shall be saved. 

33. But if ye enter not into my law ye cannot receive the 
promise of my Father, which he made unto Abraham. 

34. God commanded Abraham, and Sarah gave Hag-ar to 
Abraham to wife. And why did she do itf Because this was the 
law, and from Hagar sprang- many people. This, therefore, was 
fulfilling, among other things, the promises, 

35. Was Abraham, therefore, under condemnation? Verily, 
I say unto you. Nay; for I, the Lord, commanded it. 

36. Abraham was commanded to offer his son Isaac; never- 
theless, it was written, Thou shalt not kill. Abraham, however, 
did not refuse, and it was accounted unto him for righteousness. 

37. Abraham received concubines, and they bare him 
children, and it was accounted unto him for righteousness, be- 
cause they were given unto him, and he abode in my law, as Isaac 
also, and Jacob did none other things than that which they were 
commanded; and because they did none other things than that 
which they were commanded, they have entered into their exalt- 
ation, according to the promises, and sit upon thrones, and are 
not angels, but are Gods. 

38. David also received many wives and concubines, as also 
Solomon and Moses, my servants; as also many others of my 
servants, from the beginning of creation until this time; and 
in nothing did they sin, save in those things which they received 
not of me. 

39. David's wives and concubines were given unto him, of me, 
by the hand of Nathan, my servant, and others of the prophets who 
had the keys of this power; and in none of these things did he 
sin against me, save in the case of Uriah and his wife; and, 



il 



THE MOEMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 31 



therefore he hath fallen from his exaltation, and received his por- 
tion; and he shall not inherit them out of the world; for I gave 
them unto another, saith the Lord. 

40. I am the Lord, thy God, and I gave unto thee, my ser- 
vant Joseph, an appointment, and restore all things; ask what ye 
will, and it shall be given unto you, according to my word. 

41. And as ye have asked concerning adultery — verily, 
verily I say unto you, if a man receiveth a wife in the new and 
everlasting covenant, and if she be with another man, and I have 
not appointed unto her by the holy anointing, she hath committed 
adultery, and shall be destroyed. 

42. If she be not in the new and everlasting covenant, and 
she be with another man, she has committed adultery. 

43. And if her husband be with another woman, and he was 
under a vow, he hath broken his vow, and hath committed adul- 
tery. 

44. And if she hath not committed adultery, but is innocent, 
and hath not broken her vow, and she knoweth it, and I reveal 
it unto you, my servant Joseph, then shall you have power, by 
the power of my Holy Priesthood, to take her, and give her unto 
him that hath not committed adultery, but hath been faithful; for 
he shall be made ruler over many; 

45. For I have conferred upon you the keys and power of 
the Priesthood, wherein 1 restore all things, and make known 
unto you all things in due time. 

46. And verily, verily I say unto you, that whatsoever you 
seal on earth, shall be sealed in heaven; and whatsoever you 
bind on earth, in my name, and by my word, saith the Lord, it 
shall be eternally bound in the heavens; and whosesoever sins 
you remit on earth shall be remitted eternally in the heavens; 
and whosesoever sins you retain on earth, shall be retained in 
heaven. 

47. And again, verily I say, whomsoever you bless, I will 
bless, and whomsoever you curse, I will curse, saith the Lord; for 
I, the Lord, am thy God. 

48. And again, verily I say unto you, my servant Joseph, 
that whatsoever you give on earth, and to whomsoever you give 



32 *'the moemon pkophet's tragedy." 

any one on earth, by my word, and according to my law, it shall 
be visited with blessings, and not cursings, and with my power, 
saith the Lord, and shall be without condemnation on earth, and 
in heaven; 

49. For I am the Lord, thy God, and will be with thee even 
unto the end of the world, and through all eternity; for verily, 
I seal upon you your exaltation, and prepare a throne for you in 
the kingdom of my Father, with Abraham your father. 

50. Behold, I have seen your sacrifices, and will forgive all 
your sins; I have seen j^our sacrifices, in obedience to that which 
I have told you; go, therefoi'e, and I make a way for your es- 
cape, as I accepted the offering of Abraham of his son Isaac. 

51. Verily, I say unto you, a commandment I give unto mine 
handmaid, Emma Smith, your wife, whom I have given unto you, 
that she stay herself, and partake not of that which I commanded 
you to offer unto her; for I did it, saith the Lord, to prove you 
all, as I did Abraham; and that 1 might require an offering at 
your hands, by covenant and sacrifice; 

52. And let my handmaid, Emma Smith, receive all those 
that have been given unto my servant Joseph, and who are virtu- 
ous and pure before me; and those who are not pure, and have 
said they were pure, shall be destroyed, saith the Lord God; 

53. For I am the Lord, thy God, and ye shall obey my voice; 
and I give unto my servant Joseph, that he shall be made 
ruler over many things, for he hath been faithful over a few 
things, and from henceforth I will strengthen him. 

54. And I command mine handmaid, Emma Smith, to abide 
and cleave unto my servant Joseph, and to none else. But if she 
will not abide this commandment, she shall be destroyed, saith 
the Lord; for I am the Lord thy God, and will destroy her, if 
she abide not in my law ; 

55. But if she will not abide this commandment, then shall 
my servant Joseph do all things for her, even as he hath said; 
and I will bless him and multiply him and give unto him an hun- 
dred-fold in this world, of fathers and mothers, brothers and sis- 
ters, houses and lands, wives and children, and crowns of eternal 
lives in the eternal worlds. 



*^THE MORMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 33 

56. And again, verily I say, let mine handmaid forgive my 
servant Josesph his trespasses, and then shall she be forgiven her 
trespasses, wherein she has trespassed against me; and I, the 
Lord, thy God, will bless her, and multiply her, and make her 
heart to rejoice. 

57. And again, I say, let not my servant Joseph put his 
property out of his hands, lest an enemy come and destroy him; 
for Satan seeketh to destroy; for I am the Lord thy God, and he 
is my servant; and behold! and lo! I am with him, as I was 
with Abraham thy father, even unto his exaltation and glory. 

58. Now, as touching the law of the Priesthood, there are 
many things pertaining thereunto. 

59. Verily, if a man be called of my Father, as was Aaron, 
by mine own voice, and by the voice of him that sent me: and I 
have endowed him with the keys of the power of this Priesthood, 
if he do anything in my name, and according to my law, and by 
my word, he will not commit sin, and I wall justify him. 

60. Let no one, therefore, set on my servant Joseph; for I 
will justify him; for he shall do the sacrifice which I require at 
his hands, for his trangressions, saith the Lord your God. 

61. And again, as pertaining to the law of the Priesthood: If 
any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the 
first give her consent; and if he espouse the second, and they 
are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then is he justified; 
he cannot commit adultery, for they are given unto him; for he 
cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to 
no one else; 

62. And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, 
he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are 
given unto him, therefore he is justified. 

63. But if one or either of the ten virgins, after she is 
espoused, shall be with another man, she has committed 
adultery, and shall be destroyed; for they are given unto him to 
multiply and replenish the earth, according to my commandment, 
and to fulfil the promise which was given by my Father before 
the foundation of the world; and for their exaltation in the 
eternal worlds, that they may bear the souls of men; for 



34 ''the mormon prophet's tragedy." 

herein is the work of my Father continued, that he may be 
glorified. 

64. And again, verily, verily, I say unto you, if any man 
have a wife, who holds the keys of this power, and he teaches 
unto her the law of ray Priesthood, as pertaining to these things, 
then shall she believe, and administer unto him, or she shall be 
destroyed, saith the Lord j'^our God, for I will destroy her; for I 
will magnify my name upon all those who receive and abide in 
my law. 

65. Therefore it shall be lawful in me, if she receive not this 
law, for him to^receive all things whatsoever I, the Lord his God, 
will give unto him, because she did not administer unto him ac- 
cording to my word; and she then becomes the transgressor; and 
he is exempt from the law of Sarah, ^who administered unto Abra- 
ham, according to the law, when I commanded Abrahaai to take 
Hagar to wife. 

66. And now, as pertaining to this law, verily, verily, I say 
unto you, I will reveal more unto you, hereafter; therefore, let 
this suffice for the present. Behold, I am Alpha and Omega. 
Amen. 

HOW AND WHEN PLURAL MARRIAGE WAS ESTABLISHED. 

The date of this document, it will be observed, 
is July 12, 1843. But the principle embodied therein 
had been revealed to the Prophet many years b fore, 
even prior to 1838, the time set by Mr. Hay as a 
starting point for the alleged immoralities of the 
Mormon leader. As early as '831, while the Church 
was at Kirtland, Ohio, Joseph Rmith received reve- 
lations respecting plural maATiage, but did not com- 
mit them to writing. Neither did he practice the 
principle, nor permit its practice in the Church at that 
time. He mentioned it, however, to some of his 
trusted friends, predicted its eventual establishment, 



*'the mokmon pkophet's tkagedy." 35 

and gradually prepared the way for its introduction. 
Kirtland was the cradle of the Church. As 
an infant, less than a year old, it was carried there 
from its birthplace, Fayette, Seneca County, New 
York. In 1838 it made its headquarters at Far 
West, Caldwell County, Missouri, to which State it 
had previously sent a colony to "buildup Zion" and 
gather scattered Israel, preparatory to the coming of 
the Lord. From Jackson County — the chosen site of 
the New Jerusalem — these colonists were expelled 
with violence in the autumn of 1833; and during the 
winter of 1838-9, the entire Mormon community, 
numbering about fifteen thousand souls, were driven 
out of Missouri, under the exterminating order of 
Governor Lilburn W. Boggs. They found a refuge 
in Hancock County, Illinois, where they built the 
City of Nauvoo, and it was there that the revelation 
on plural marriage was first committed to writing. 
Uttered by Joseph, the Prophet, it was taken down 
by William Clayton, his scribe. 

In obedience to this divine command, — for such 
he declared it to be, — and several years before the 
revelation was thus recorded, Joseph Smith mar- 
ried plural wives, and taught the principle to others, 
who also practiced it. But this was done privately, 
owing to the great opposition foreseen. Let no 
one think that it was not a trial to those called 
upon to introduce it. Hep worth Dixon was right. 
Brigham Young told the truth when he said he was op- 
posed originally to ''plural households.'' Instead of 
a bait," it was a cross, to men as well as women, 



(( 



36 '^THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TEAGEDY.'^ 

and these so-called "profligates'' had the fiercest 
kinds of struggles with themselves before they could 
conquer their native prejudices and accept a principle 
so foreign to their Anglo-Saxon traditions and Puri- 
tanic training. However divine it might be, it was 
a startling innovation, this restored marriage system 
of the Hebrew patriarchs; and though designed for 
physical and moral regeneration here and eternal ex- 
altation hereafter, it was with heavy hearts that these 
heroic men and women took up the burden. Mor- 
mon plural marriage, practiced from the days of 
Nauvoo down to the time of the prohibitory "Mani- 
festo" of 1890, was not a system of licentiousness; 
it was designed to correct and abolish such evils. It 
enjoined strict purity of life, imposed obligations, in- 
volved trials, and demanded from husbands and 
wives sacrifices of which those who never lived in 
it never dreamed. Only the best of men and women 
were considered worthy to live this higher law; and 
indeed only the best and noblest were capable of liv- 
ing it aright. These were called to be the pioneers 
in its establishment. 

Emma Smith, the Prophet's wife, over whose 
particular case Mr. Hay makes merry, was among 
those who obeyed the commandment. She fulfilled 
' * the law of Sarah' ' and gave wives to her husband ; but 
like Sarah she was not equal to a sustained effort in 
that direction, and so fell away, repudiated the prin- 
ciple, and is said to have gone so far as to declare that 
Joseph never practiced it. She maintained, it is al- 
leged, that Brigham Young (whom she disliked) or- 



**THE MORMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY." 37 

iginated the doctrine after the Prophet's death. But 
the evidence of Joseph's origination, or first utterance 
of the revelation, and Emma's acceptance thereof, 
is too voluminous and too conclusive to admit of 
doubt. It was Joseph Smith, not Brigham Young, 
who introduced and established plural marriage in 
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 

Upon some of the points touched in the preced- 
ing paragraphs, we have the following statement 
from the late Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, whose 
father, Heber C. Kimball, was one of the Twelve 
Apostles of the Church, and her mother, Vilate Mur- 
ray Kimball, a first wife who gave other wives to her 
husband. 

MRS. Whitney's statement. 

''My mother often told me that she could not 
doubt that the plural order of marriage was of God, 
for the Lord had revealed it to her in answer to prayer. 

''In Nauvoo, shortly after his return from Eng- 
land [July, 1841], my father, among others of his 
brethren, was taught the plural wife doctrine, and 
was told by Joseph the Prophet, three times, to go 
and take a certain woman as his wife ; but not till he 
commanded him in the name of the Lord did he 
obey. At the same time Joseph told him not to di- 
vulge this secret, not even to my mother, for fear 
that she would not receive it; for his life was in con- 
stant jeopardy, not only from outside influences and 
enemies who were seeking some plea to take him 
back to Missouri, but from false brethren who had 



38 ^^THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 

crept like snakes into his bosom and then betrayed him. 

''My father realized the situation fully, and the 
love and reverence he bore the Prophet were so great 
that he would sooner have laid down his life than 
have betrayed him. This was one of the greatest 
tests of his faith he had ever experienced. The 
thought of deceiving the kind and faithful wife of 
his youth, whom he loved with all his heart, and 
who with him had borne so patiently their separa- 
tions, and all the trials and sacrifices they had been 
called to endure, was more than he felt able to bear. 

"He realized not only the addition of trouble and 
perplexity that such a step must bring upon him, 
but his sorrow and misery were increased by the 
thought of my mother's hearing of it from some 
other source, which would no doubt separate them, 
and he shrank from the thought of such a thing, or 
of causing her any unhappiness. Finally he was so 
tried that he went to Joseph and told him how he 
felt — that he was fearful if he took such a step he 
could not stand, but would be overcome. The 
Prophet, full of sympathy for him, went and in- 
quired of the Lord. His answer was, 'Tell him to go 
and do as he has been commanded, and if I see that 
there is any danger of his apostatizing, I will take 
him to myself.' 

"The fact that he had to be commanded three 
times to do this thing shows that the trial must have 
been extraordinary, for he was a man who, from the 
first, had yielded implicit obedience to every require- 
ment of the Prophet, 



**THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TEAGEDY." 39 

''When first heaving the principle taught, be- 
lieving that he would be called upon to enter into it, 
he had thought of two elderly ladies named Pitkin, 
great friends of my mother's, who, he believed, would 
cause her little if any unhappiness. But the woman 
he was commanded to take was an English lady 
named Sarah Noon, nearer my mother's age, who 
came over with the company of Saints in the same 
ship in which father and Brother Brigham returned 
from Europe. She had been married and was the 
mother of tw^o little girls, but left her husband on 
account of his drunken and dissolute habits. Father 
was told to take her as his wife and provide for her 
and her children, and he did so. 

'*My mother had noticed a change in his manner 
and appearance, and when she inqmred the cause, 
he tried to evade her questions. At last he promised 
he would tell her after a while, if she would only 
wait. This trouble so worked upon his mind that 
his anxious and haggard looks betrayed him daily 
and hourly, and finally his misery became so un- 
bearable that it was impossible to control his feelings. 
He became sick in body, but his mental wretchedness 
was too great to allow of his retiring, and he would 
walk the floor till nearly morning, and sometimes 
the agony of his mind was so terrible that he would 
wring his hands and weep like a child, and beseech 
the Lord to be merciful and reveal to her this prin- 
ciple, for he himself could not break his vow of 
secrecy. 

''The anguish of their hearts was indescribable, 



40 '*THE MOKMON PROPHET'S TRAGEDY." 

and when she found it was useless to beseech him 
longer, she retired to her room and bowed before the 
Lord and poured out her soul in prayer to Him who 
hath said: 'If any lack wisdom let him ask of God, 
who giveth to ali men liberally and upbraideth not. ' 
My father's heart was raised at the same time in sup- 
plication. While pleading as one would plead for 
life, the vision of her mind was opened, and as dark- 
ness flees before the morning sun, so did her sorrow 
and the groveling things of earth vanish away. 

'* Before her was illustrated the order of celestial 
marriage, in all its beauty and glory, together with 
the great exaltation and honor it would confer upon 
her in that immortal and celestial sphere, if she 
would accept it and stand in her place by her hus- 
band's side. She also saw the woman he had taken 
to wife, and contemplated with joy the va^t and 
boundless love and union which this order would 
bring about, as well as the increase of her husband's 
kingdoms, and the power and glory extending 
throughout the eternities, worlds without end. 

"With a countenance beaming with joy, for she 
was filled with the Spirit of Grod, she returned to my 
father, saying: 'Heber, what you kept from me the 
Lord has shown me.' She told me she never saw so 
happy a man as father was when she described the 
vision and told him she was satisfied and knew it 
was from God. 

''She covenanted to stand by him and honor the 
principle, which covenant she faithfully kept, and 
though her trials were often heavy and grievous to 



**THE MOEMON PROPHET 'S TRAGEDY." 41 

bear, she knew that father was also being tried, and 
her integrity was unflinching to the end. She gave 
my father many wives, and they always found in my 
mother a faithful friend." 

A LIVING WIDOW OP THE PROPHET. 

Up to within a few years there resided in Utah 
se^^eral of the widows of the Prophet Joseph Smith ; 
and they were among the most refined, most virtuous, 
most intelligent women in the community. After 
Joseph's death they remarried, some of them as 
plural wives. One of these ladies is still living. She 
is known as Mrs. Lucy Walker Kimball, and her 
home is at No. 332 East Fourth South Street, Salt 
Lake City. Mrs. Kimball is personally cognizant of 
the fact that Emma Smith gave wives to her hus- 
band and helped to protect him in the practice of 
plural marriage. 

JOHN C. BE}n?NETT's ROMANCES AND RASCALITIES. 

It was John C. Bennett who set afloat the false- 
hood that Joseph Smith sanctioned illicit relations 
between the sexes. A more consummate villain never 
practiced upon the patience of a community than 
this man Bennett; if man he may be called. He was 
more fiend than man, an lago in real life, a Mach- 
iavellian of the worst type. Governor Thomas Ford, 
in his history of Illinois, refers to him as ^^probably 
the greatest scamp in the western country." He had 
associated himself with the Mormon people soon 
after their cruel expulsion from Missouri. Profess- 



42 **THE MOEMON PROPHET' S TKAGEDY." 

ing great sympathy for the persecuted Saints, he was 
apparently a sincere convert to their faith. At that 
time he held the office of Quarter- master General of 
Illinois, i ducated, and considerable of a diplomat, 
he assisted to secure from the Legislature the chart- 
er of the City of Nauvoo. He was known from the 
first as egotistical and vain, but that he was corrupt 
and unprincipled did not immediately appear. He 
was rewarded for his services in working for the 
charter, with the mayoralty of the city. He also 
became Chancellor of the University and Major-Gen- 
eral of the Legion, at Nauvoo. 

In May, 1842, Bennett's treachery and ras- 
cality became known to his benefactor, Joseph 
Smith, whose life, it seems, he had basely attempted. 
Soon afterward he was convicted of the crime of seduc- 
tion and severed from the Church . Vindictive in the 
extreme, he invented all sorts of stories to bring trouble 
upon his former friends. Some of these he circu- 
lated before his excommunication ; notably the canard 
in relation to the Prophet's licentiousness. Affect- 
ing deep contrition after his exposure, he voluntarily 
made affidavit that Joseph Smith had never taught 
him anything contrary to the principles of truth and 
virtue, and so far as he knew the Prophet's private 
life was above reproach. Finding that he could not 
regain the confidence of the community, he withdrew 
from Nauvoo and became for a time the head and 
front of an anti-Mormon movement. He wrote and 
published a book, a pretended expose of Mormon- 
ism in which he revived the false story of the 



*'the mormon prophet's tragedy." 43 

''Danites," or ''Destroying Angels," originally told 
by Dr. Avard, another apostate, in Missouri. Ben- 
nett declared that these "Danites" (Mormon aveng- 
ers) were following him, to put him out of the way. 
He alleged that Joseph Smith was about to make 
himself a king; that he was planning the overthrow 
of the American republic, and the founding of a des- 
potic empire upon its ruins ; that he even then kept 
a seraglio, like an oriental monarch, and if permitted 
to gain the power he coveted would gratify to the 
full upon the persons and properties of his Mormon 
and non-Mormon subjects, his lustful passions and 
tyrannical instincts. 

It was Bennett who invented the jargon of 
"spiritual wives." I mean that the phrase was 
his, but it was never the accepted title of the prin- 
ciple it pretended to describe. This and his other 
jargons about "cyprian saints," "chambered sisters 
of charity," "consecratees of the cloister," etc., 
were invented to cover up his own iniquity, and to 
wreak revenge upon the Prophet, who had re- 
pudiated him and his villainies Bennett was guilty 
of all the sexual sins, amours, seductions, attempted 
and m some cases consummated, that he falsely 
charged upon Joseph Smith. 

The intelligent and reputable anti-Mormons, — 
whose casus belli against the Prophet and his people 
was their alleged political solidarity, --despised Bennett 
and distrusted his sensational story; but some were 
simple enough to give the vile wretch, whiose innate 
wickedness shows on every page of hia book, the 



44 *^THE MOKMON PEOPHET'S TRAGEDY." 

unmerited credence that he craved; accepting Jiolus 
bolus the assertion of this liar and hypocrite, that his 
motive for becoming a Mormon had been to acquaint 
himself with the Prophet's treasonable designs (which 
he had before suspected) , in order that he might be 
the savior of his country! He fully exemplified the 
truth of bluff old Dr. Johnson's proverb: * 'Patriot- 
ism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." 

Bennett had as his coadjutors the worst elements 
of the anti-Mormon party, which rallied to its stand- 
ard, not only some very respectable persons, but 
every ruffian having a grudge or grievance against 
the unpopular Church or any of its members. He 
was also in league with a ring of apostates at Nau- 
voo, who secretly aided him in the preparation of his 
so-called expose, A double-headed conspiracy ex- 
isted, the object of which was the overthrow of the 
Mormon power, religiously and politically ; the des- 
truction of the leaders, and the extermination, if 
need be, of their followers. This is no exaggera- 
tion. Out of their own mouths shall the guilty 
be judged. 

JOSEPH SMITH A PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE. 

To show at a glance how groundless was the 
charge that Joseph Smith proposed making himself a 
king, it is but needful to cite the fact that the open- 
ing of 1844, the year of the martyrdom, witnessed his 
candidacy for the Presidency of the United States. 
An ardent lover of liberty, a descendant of pil- 
grims and patriots who had helped to found the 



'*THE MOKMON PROPHET 'S TRAGEDY/' 45 

natioD ; the first man on earth to declare that the 
American government came by inspiration from 
God; he, of all men, to be accused of plotting for its 
overthrow! His mind, at this very period, was 
wrought upon by the most patriotic impulses, look- 
ing to the still greater glory and grandeur of his 
country. He favored "the extension of the Union, 
with the consent of the red man, from sea to sea;" 
'Hhe annexation of Texas, if she petitioned for it, 
and of Canada and Mexico, whenever they should de- 
sire to enter the Union;" also the abolition of slav- 
ery, though upon the basis of a just and proper re- 
muneration of the slave-holders by the general gov- 
ernment. Said he: "We have had Democratic Pres- 
idents, Whig Presidents, a pseudo-Democratic- Whig 
President; and now it is time to have a President of 
the United States." These were among his pro- 
nounced political views. Do they savor of kingcraft 
and tyranny! Again he said: "I feel it to be my 
right and privilege to obtain what influence and pow- 
er I can, lawfully, in the United States, for the pro- 
tection of injured innocence; and if 1 lose my life in 
a good cause, I am willing to be sacrificed on the 
altar of virtue, righteousness and truth, in maintain- 
ing the laws and Constitution of the United States, 
if need be, for the general good of mankind." A 
courageous spirit, truly; a cosmopolitan spirit; but 
not the spirit of disloyalty. 

To promulgate these views through the Eastern, 
Northern, and Southern States, and work for the 
Prophet in the campaign, went forth from Nauvoo, 



46 '*THE MOllMON PEOPHET's TKAGEDY.'^ 

in the spring of that memorable year, such men as 
Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, Parley and 
Orson Pratt, George A. Smith, Wilford Woodruff, 
and other Mormon stalwarts. Hyrum Smith, the 
Patriarch of the Church; Willard Richards, its his- 
torian; John Taylor, editor of the ''Times and 
Seasons'' and the "Nauvoo Neighbor," with other 
prominent Elders, remained with the Prophet in Ill- 
inois. 

THE NAUVOO EXPOSITOR. 

It was just at this juncture that the "Nauvoo 
Expositor" made its appearance. The publishers of 
that paper were William and Wilson Law^, Charles 
Ivins, Francis M. and Chauncey L. Higbee, Robert D. 
and Charles A. Foster. Most of these were apostate 
Mormons, who looked upon Joseph Smith as "a 
fallen prophet," though they still professed faith in 
the doctrines originally taught by him. They had 
set up a church of their own, with William Law at 
its head. He had been Joseph's second counselor 
in the First Presidency, but had found, like Sidney 
Rigdon, the first counselor, a stumbling block in 
plural marriage. President Rigdon, by the way, had 
left Nauvoo and was living at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, 
at this crisis in the affairs of the Church. Subse- 
quently he laid claim to the leadershix>, but was re- 
jected by the vote of the members, who sustained 
Brigham Young, the senior of the Twelve Apostles, 
as the right Pul successor to President Joseph Smith. 
William Law was presumably the "Mr. Law" referred 



\ *'the mokmon prophet's tragedy. '' 47 

to by Colonel Hay, as having purchased, in con- 
nection with one '^Doctor Foster," a press and types, 
with the intention of turning the light upon the al- 
leged ''iniquity'' of the Mormon leader. William 
Law was naturally a good and upright man, but had 
fallen under an influence inimical to the Prophet, and 
was now much embittered against him. His brother, 
Wilson Law, the successor to John C. Bennett as 
Major-General of the Nauvoo Legion, had been cash- 
iered for dishonesty and had resigned. Robert D 
Foster, the "Doctor Foster" of the Hay narrative,' 
had been sharply reprimanded by the Prophet, for an 
act bordering on immorality. In Bennett's book he is 
referred to by one of his own party, George W. Rob- 
inson, as "that notable liar, scoundrel and villain." 
A similar cloud rested upon others of the little coterie 
of backsliders. 

It is hardly necessary to say that the charges of 
unchastity made against Joseph Smith, all grew out 
of the practice of plural marriage, a thing very easi- 
ly misunderstood, and very liable to be misrepre- 
sented, especially in those days, when it had not 
been openly avowed, and was practiced only in pri- 
vate. Upon a complaint signed by William Law 
charging him with polygamy, the Prophet stood in- 
dicted at Carthage, the county seat of Hancock 
County, at the time of the issuance of the "Nau- 
voo Expositor." 

The avowed purpose of this publication, as an- 
nounced in its prospectus, dated May 10th, 1844, was 
to advocate "the unconditional repeal of the Nauvoo 



48 ''THE MOKMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY." 

City Charter," efforts to which end had abeady been 
made in the Illinois legislature. A further design, as 
shown by the first and final number of the paper, 
which made its appearance on the 7th of June, was 
to libel the Mormon leaders, and bring upon them 
and their people the terrible power of the mob. The 
main target, as a matter of course, was the Prophet 
at the head of the Church. 

* 'It was clear," says Mr. Hay, ''that a crisis had 
arisen in his fortunes. A clearer-headed man than 
he might well have hesitated as to the course most 
expedient to pursue. To disregard this sudden and 
vigorous attack might prove fatal to his prestige. 
We may smile at the lame grammar and turgid rhet- 
oric of the Expositor^ but it was a better paper than 
Smith's organ, the Neighbor. Parmi les aveugles le 
horgne est roi."^ A little brains went farther in 
Nauvoo than anywhere else on earth. Contemptible 
as the Expositor was. Smith could not despise it. To 
resort to violence might lead to bloody reprisals. 
But his rowdy instincts decided the question. He 
procured from his corrupt and servile municipal court 
an order declaring the new journal a public nuisance. 
A party of his myrmidons destroyed the press and 
pied the offending types. 

"This act was Smith's death-warrant. There- 
after the mob could say to the prophet, The villainy 
you teach me I will execute." 

A luminous sample, this, of our learned author's 



* Among the blind the mole is king. 



**THE MORMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY." 49 

V, 

logic. The abatement of a libelous newspaper, 
officially condemned as a public nuisance under the 
provisions of a duly enacted municipal ordinance; a 
peaceable, orderly proceeding, done by the regular 
police, under the direction of the Mayor and City 
Council, Mr. Hay considers an act of lawlessness, 
and virtually pleads it in extenuation of the vio- 
lence of the mob which retaliated by murdering Joseph 
and Hyrum Smith. In a land of Bibles and churches, 
of laws and of courts, with the Mormons in the min- 
ority, the only way to get even with them, for an act 
of alleged riot, in which no blood was spilt, and no 
personal injury inflicted, was to treacherously impris- 
on and foully murder their leaders! Was it by dint 
of such powerful reasoning as this that John Hay 
rose to eminence? His narrative goes on: 

* 'Smith's official paper, the Neighbor, gave a 
full account of the proceeding. The article ends in 
these words, which bear a cuiious family likeness to 
the protests for ever made by slaveholders and other 
enemies of the human race, against the reprisals of 
law and justice. They want nothing more than to 
be let alone. 'And in the name of freemen, and in 
the name of God, we beseech all men who have the 
spirit of honor in them to cease from persecuting us 
collectively or individually. Let us enjoy our relig- 
ion, rights, and peace, like the rest of mankind. 
Why start presses to destroy rights and privileges, 
and bring upon us mobs to plunder and murder? We 
ask no more than what belongs to us — the rights of 
Americans.' " 



50 **THE MORMON PEOPHET'S TEAGEDY.'' 

The attempt to parallel the case of the Mormons 
with that of * 'slaveholders and other enemies of the 
human race," and to dignify the deeds of mobs 
into ''the reprisals of law and justice," is another 
argumental absurdit5^ Where premises are wrong, 
conclusions are apt to be illegitimate. The Mor- 
mons were neither slaveholders nor enemies of the 
human race. They were what they claimed to be, 
Americans, loyal and law-abiding. As such, they 
had the right "to be let alone," even by Mr. Hay 
and his illogical criticisms. But let him proceed: 

"Foster and Law fled, like the vanquished Mar- 
ius, to Carthage. Although the county authorities, 
who had been elected on the Democratic ticket and 
had received the solid Mormon vote, were disposed 
to deal as gently as possible with the autocrat of 
Nauvoo, they could not refuse the warrants of arrest 
for which the fugitives applied. These were granted 
against Joseph and Hiram Smith and sixteen others 
of the rioters. But when the deputy sheriff went to 
Nauvoo the Mormons smiled at his simplicity, and 
went through the form of arrest, habeas corpus ^ trial, 
and acquittal before that singular municipal court of 
which the prophet was judge, jury, counsel, and pris- 
oner, with a promptness and celerity that astonished 
the officer. They then sent him back to Carthage, 
with significant admonitions. 

THE SPIRIT OF MURDER RAMPANT. 

"These occurrences gave rise to an excitement in 
the county which one, regarding the matter calmly 



u 



THE MORMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY/^ 51 



from this distance, finds it difficult to account for. 
Public meetings were held in every precinct. Vol- 
unteer companies sprang up everywhere at the tap of 
a drum. There was drilling on every common, and 
hoarse eloquence in all the school houses. Expresses 
were riding on all the roads with imperfectly defined 
purposes. The brigadier- general commanding the 
militia ordered a levy en masse in the adjoining 
counties. The newspapers of the county grew hys- 
terical with exclamation points and ^display type.' 
The Warsaw Signal, published at the headquarters 
of the anti-Mormons by Mr. Thomas C Sharp, was 
simply frantic in its issue of the 12th of June. Here 
is an extract. I regret not to be able to give the ec- 
centricities of lettering by which the words seem to 
shriek on the page. A letter from Foster relates the 
destruction of the Expositor press. The Signal adds: 
'*We have only to state that this is sufficient! War 
and extermination is inevitable! Citizens Arise, One 
and All! ! ! Can you stand by, and suffer such In- 
fernal Devils ! to Rob men of their property and 
Rights, without avenging them? We have no time 
to comment: every man will make his own. Let it 
be made with Powder and Ball! ! ! ' " 

accounting for the unaccountable. 

Then follows a labored effort to account for the 
unwarrantable agitation, to excuse the bloody 
deed resulting from this direct incitement to murder. 
It is made to appear that at a public meeting held in 



52 **THE MOKMON PEOPHET's TKAGED\." 

Nauvoo the day before, ''Joe Smith alluded darkly 
to other sinners that might tempt his wrath too far," 
and ''denounced the ultimate pains upon all who 
were not willing to wade knee deep in blood to do 
his bidding;" also that Hyrum Smith covertly 
threatened "long-nosed Sharp" with "a pinch of 
snuff that would make him sneeze." Mr. Hay then 
tells how for four years the entire County of Han- 
cock had been kept in a state of unwholesome excite- 
ment by "these people" (the Mormons), the large 
majority of whom were "ignorant, honest, hard- 
working folk," "harmless and peaceable," and yet, 
according to his peculiar logic, "bad neighbors." 
The Mormon vote was ' 'invariably cast for the Dem- 
ocratic ticket." (Mr. Hay was a Republican). 
' 'Thieves and vagrants were in Nauvoo patronized 
and protected." "The City Charter, granted by the 
Legislature in a sordid subserviency, gave to the 
municipal court a wide jurisdiction," and "the 
accused Mormon, appealing to this court for protec- 
tion against the persecuting Gentile, always got off 
scott free." The Mayor and common council at 
Nauvoo treated with high-handed contempt the laws 
of the State, and sworn officers of the law, elected by 
the solid Mormon vote, connived at such proceed- 
ings. The Prophet, "intoxicated with so abnormal a 
power," began to develop royal vices; appropriated 
the exclusive right to deal in real estate, to sell 
liquor, to marry and to give in marriage, and finally 
(crime of crimes!) became a presidential candidate, 
and "went so far as to have views and to publish 



**THE MORMON PROPHET 'S TRAGEDY.'* 53 

them." Some minor charges are made, and Mr. 
Hay then sums up the case as follows : 

'4t was this arrogant sense of his own power 
that at last destroyed him. At first he treated the 
sheriff's warrant with contempt. At the second sum- 
mons, he told the officer he would go the next day 
with him to Carthage. He did not keep his appoint- 
ment. The officer went back to Carthage alone. 
But a day or two afterwards, the Smiths came riding 
into Carthage unattended, except by their common 
council and others accused of riot, and gave them- 
selves up to the county authorities." 

GOVERNOR ford's VERSION. 

The inner history of that transaction, — the at- 
tempt to arrest the Prophet and carry him to Carth- 
age, not to be tried, but to be murdered, — is given 
by Governor Ford as follows : 

*'Upon the arrival of the constable and guard 
(at Nauvoo), the Mayor and common council at once 
signified their willingness to surrender, and stated 
their readiness to proceed to Carthage next morn- 
ing at eight o'clock. Martial law had previously 
been abolished. The hour of eight o'clock came, 
and the accused failed to make their appearance. 
The constable and his escort returned. The con- 
stable made no effort to arrest any of them, nor 
would he or the guard delay their departure one 
minute beyond the time, to see whether an arrest 
could be made. Upon their return, they reported 



54 ''the mormon peophet's tragedy.*^ 

that they had been informed that the accused had 
fled and could not be found. 

*'I immediately proposed to a council of officers 
to march into Nauvoo with a small force then under 
my command, but the officers were of opinion 
that it was too small, and many of them insisted up- 
on a further call of the militia. Upon reflection I 
was of opinion that the officers were right in the 
estimate of our force, and the project for immediate 
action was abandoned. I was soon informed, how- 
ever, of the conduct of the constable and guard, and 
then I was perfectly satisfied that a most base fraud 
had beeen attempted; that, in fact, it was feared 
that the Mormons would submit, and thereby entitle 
themselves to the protection of the law. It was very 
apparent that many of the bustling, active spirits 
were afraid that there would be no occasion for call- 
ing out an overwhelming militia force, for marching 
it into Nauvoo, for probable mutiny when there, and 
for the extermination of the Mormon race. It ap- 
peared that the 'Constable and the escort were fully 
in the secret and acted well their part to promote the 
conspiracy." 

^'I gradually learned," says the Governor, '*to 
my entire satisfaction, that there was a plan to get 
the troops into Nauvoo and then begin the war, 
probably by some of our own party, or some of the 
seceding Mormons, taking advantage of the night 
to fire on our own force, and then laying it on the 
Mormons. I was satisfied that there were those 
among us fully capable of such an act, hoping that 



u 



THE MOKMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY.'* 55 



in the alarm, bustle and confusion of a militia camp, 
the truth could not be discovered, and that it might 
lead to the desired collision/' 

Governor Ford's attitude in this and in other 
matters, \vith the language employed by him to de- 
scribe the acts and aims of the radical members of 
his party, makes clear that he was not in sym- 
pathy with those citizens of Illinois, and partic- 
ularly of Hancock County, who had made up their 
minds to emulate Governor Boggs and his Missouri- 
ans, and "exterminate the Mormon people or drive 
them from the State." I do not mean to say that 
all the non-Mormon residents of Hancock County 
were united upon this outrageous proposition. Far 
from it. According to Mr. Thomas Gregg, the his- 
torian of that county, there were three classes of cit- 
izens there, in addition to the Mormons themselves. 
These he names as follows : (1) *' Jack- Mormons," 
(a term used to designate those who for any reason 
were friendly to the unpopular people) ; (2) *'old 
citizens who were anti-MormoQS at heart, but who 
refused to countenance any but lawful measures for 
redress of grievances;" and (3) '^anti-Mormons, 
who, now that the crisis had come, advocated 'war 
and extermination.' " 



HOW THIEVES WERE '^PATRONIZED AND PROTECTED." 

The best answer to Mr. Hay's assertion that 
thieves and vagrants were patronized and protected 
in Nauvoo, is the following proclamation, issued 



56 ^'the moemon prophet's tragedy.'' 

by the Prophet, as Mayor of the City, March 25, 
1843: 

"Whereas, it is reported that there now exists a band of des- 
peradoes, bound by oaths of secrecy, under severe penalties in 
case any member of the combination divulges their plans of steal- 
ing- and conveying properties from station to station up and down 
the Mississippi and other routes: And: 

"Whereas it is reported that the fear of the execution of the 
pains and penalties of their secret oaths on their persons prevents 
some members of said secret association (who have, through 
falsehood and deceit, been drawn into their snares,) from di- 
vulging the same to the legally constituted authorities of the 
land: 

"Know ye, therefore, that I, Joseph Smith, Mayor of the 
city of Nauvoo, will grant and insure protection against all per- 
sonal mob violence, to each and every citizen of this city, who 
will come before me and truly make known the names of all such 
abominable characters as are engaged in said secret combination 
for stealing, or are accessory thereto in any manner. And I res- 
pectfully solicit the co-operation of all ministers of justice in this 
and the neighboring states to ferret out a baud of thievish out- 
laws from our midst." 

*'the solid mormon vote." 

The charge of political solidarity, even if true, 
would not justify murder and extermination. But it 
is not true that the Mormon vote in Illinois was an 
absolutely solid vote, or that it was cast invariably 
for the Democratic ticket. That is simply a politi- 
cian's partisan fling. He wanted to say something 
hard about the Democrats, and the situation at Nau- 
voo, as imagined and described by him, gave the 
opportunity. Here is the reference in full: **The 



*'the mormon prophet's tragedy.'* 57 

Mormon vote, being always cast solid, was all pow- 
erful in the county and of no slight importance in 
the State, It was invariably cast for the Democratic 
ticket, as is the Fenian vote today. And, like the 
Fenian vote, it had a demoralizing influence upon 
both parties; the one making dishonorable advances 
to gain it, and the other making humiliating con- 
cessions to retain it. By this means the Mormons 
ruled the county." It is not true, I repeat, that the 
Mormon vote was ''always cast solid," or that it was 
invariably thrown to the Democratic side. In 1840, 
the year of the famous ''log cabin" campaign, the 
Mormons as a majority voted for the Whig electors 
and helped to make General Harrison President of 
the United States. This was probably due to the 
position of the Democratic presidential candidate, 
Martin Van Buren, on the Mormon question. Re- 
garding the Missouri persecutions, he had said to 
Joseph Smith, at Washington: "Your cause is just, 
but I can do nothing for you; if I take up for you, I 
shall lose the vote of Missouri." In 1843 Nauvoo 
went Democratic, helping to elect Joseph P. Hoge to 
Congress, over Cyrus Walker, the Whig candidate, 
for whom, however, Joseph Smith cast his individual 
vote. At the same election, the Mormons in Adams 
County gave their ballots to O. H. Browning, the 
Whig candidate in that district. Most of the Mor- 
mons were traditionally Democrats, but that they 
voted for their friends, instead of their enemies, and 
used their power, such as it was, to put whom they 
considered the best men in office, regardless at 



58 **THE MORMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY." 

times of party affiliations, is conceded. Other 
people have done the same, and have not been 
slaughtered for it, nor even threatened with annihil- 
ation by their irritated fellow citizens. Why should 
the Mormons have been? 

Against the unsupported assertion that the au- 
thorities at Nauvoo treated with high-handed con- 
tempt the laws of the State, I place an emphatic de- 
nial, and as no case in point is cited, I do not feel 
called upon to prove a negative. The same answer will 
suffice for the allegation as to the Prophet's threat of 
''ultimate pains" upon all who would not ''wade 
knee-deep in blood to do his bidding." Joseph 
Smith never said it. Such of the remainirg charges 
as are at all consequential, will be answered in due 
course. 

THE NAUVOO CHARTER. 

The Nauvoo Charter, under which the famous 
Municipal Court, and the no less noted Legion had 
been organized, was one of the most liberal grants of 
power ever bestowed by a legislature upon a munici- 
pality. The date of the passage of this act, which 
incorporated the City of Nauvoo, was February 1st, 
1841. Among the legislators who voted for it was 
the great Lincoln himself, who is said to have warm- 
ly congratulated the Mormons upon its passage. 
Was his motive one of "sordid subserviency," 
Mr. Hay? The Charter had been planned as the 
Prophet, its framer, said, "on principles so broad 
that any honest man might dwell secure under its 



**THE MORMON PEOPHET^S TRAGEDY.^' 59 

protective influence.^' Under its benign provisions, 
Nauvoo had been made a temperance city — the sale 
of liquor at retail being strictly prohibited — and a 
free city, where the rights of all sects and parties 
were guaranteed and jealously guarded. The Nau- 
voo Charter, whatever may be said of *^ wide juris- 
dictions,'' and the * ^privileges" accorded alike to 
Mormon and non- Mormon citizens, was the bulwark 
of their rights and liberties against the aggressions 
of lawless and murderous foes. The Municipal Court 
and the habeas corpus was all that kept the Prophet 
and his friends from being kidnapped and carried 
back to their cruel and illegal imprisonment in Mis- 
souri, a fate worse than death, from which they had 
escaped soon after the terrible midwinter expulsion 
of their people. The mailed arm of the Legion — an 
all but indepenient body of troops, officered by Mor- 
mons, but recognized as a part of the regular militia 
— interposed to prevent a repetition of the sanguinary 
scenes of Haun's Mill and Far West. This Charter 
annulled, this rock of defense swept away, and what 
calamities might not come, what evils flourish un- 
checked, in the midst of the peaceable, moral, and 
well-meaning community? Yet this was the issue 
proposed by the ' 'Nauvoo Expositor," and by those 
in sympathy with the movement of which it was the 
mouthpiece 

THE EXPOSITOR ABATEMENT. 

The principal charges made by that paper 
against the Prophet and his associates, were poly- 



60 ^'the mokmon pkophet's tkagedy.^^ 

gamy, polytheism, and the union of Church and 
State. In addition to these allegations, there were 
various dark hints as to certain, or uncertain, crimi- 
nal acts said to have been committed by them, and 
more libels of the same kind were promised in the 
future. In the light of later events, and the super- 
human patience manifested by the Mormon people 
toward hostile and abusive publications, one almost 
marvels how so much indignation could have been 
aroused by the comparatively tame and feeble tone 
of the *'Nauvoo Expositor." But this was the be- 
ginning of their experience in such matters, before 
the much- maligned community had learned to bear and 
forbear to the extent that they have since endured. 
It was not only the Mormons, however, who 
were provoked at the course begun and threatened 
by the ^'Expositor." Peace-loving people of all 
parties and persuasions felt indignant. Many wished 
to take the law into their own hands and level the 
offending printing office to the ground. But the 
Mormon leaders, the heads of the municipality, 
would not sanction such proceedings. Legal meas- 
ures, instead of lawless force, were employed. At 
sessions of the City Council, held on Saturday and 
Monday, the 8th and 10th of June, the character, 
aims, and objects of the libelous sheet and its pub- 
lishers were fully ventilated, and by an almost unani- 
mous vote, — Counselor Benjamin Warrington alone 
dissenting — the '^Expositor" was declared a public 
nuisance, and the'Mayor instructed to have it abated 
without delay. Mr. Warrington, who was not a 



**THE MORMON PROPHET 'S TRAGEDY." 61 

Mormon, only opposed summary action. He consid- 
ered the paper libelous, and was in favor of heavily 
fining its publishers. On the evening of the 10th, by 
order of Mayor Smith, a force of police under City 
Marshal John P. Greene, destroyed the printing 
press, pied the type, and burned the published sheets 
found upon the premises in the streets of Nauvoo. 
The editors and publishers immediately left the 
city. 

THE prophet's ARREST AND LIBERATION. 

Two days later, upon a complaint sworn to by 
Francis M. Higbee, Constable David Bettis worth 
came from Carthage to Nauvoo and arrested for 
**riot," Joseph Smith, Samuel Bennett, John Tay- 
lor, William W. Phelps, Hyrum Smith, John P. 
Greene, Stephen Perry, Dimick B. Huntington, Jon- 
athan Dunham, Stephen Markham, William Edwards, 
Jonathan Harmon, Jesse P. Harmon, John Lytle, 
Joseph W. Coolidge, Harvey D. Redfield, Orrin 
Porter Rockwell and Levi Richards. The warrants 
required that the accused be brought before Justice 
Thomas Morrison, at Carthage, '*or some other just- 
ice of the peace in Hancock County.'' In view of 
this alternative, they requested the privilege of going 
before one of the justices of Nauv^oo; but the con- 
stable insisted upon taking them to Carthage. There- 
upon they sued out writs of habeas corpus, went be- 
fore the Municipal Court, which claimed jurisdiction 
in such cases, and after a hearing were discharged. 
Subsequently, by advice of Judge Jesse B. Thomas, 



62 ^*THE MORMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 

who was visiting Nauvoo, Mayor Smith and his 
friends underwent examination before Justic Daniel 
H. Wells, a non-Mormon, and were again dis- 
charged; it appearing that their cause in relation to 
the ^'Expositor," while summary, was strictly legal 
under the charter and ordinances of the city. Squire 
Wells, foreseeing that not even this would satisfy the 
opposition, advised the Prophet to be tried at Carth- 
age. [This was before the mob had gathered in 
force at that point] . But the latter did not feel that 
his life would be safe there, and the sequel justified 
the conclusion. 

MARTIAL lAW AT NAUVOO. 

On the 16th of June Mayor Smith issued a pro- 
clamation, stating why the act of abatement had 
been deemed necessary, and declaring that the city 
authorities were willing to appear, whenever the 
Governor should require it, before any high court in 
the State, and answer for the correctness of their 
conduct. He also warned the lawless element, now 
gathering against Nauvoo, not to interfere in the 
affairs of that city. Governor Ford had previously 
been informed of the situation, but no reply had come 
from him. The excitement throughout the county 
was intense. Armed men were taking the field in 
deadly earnest. Carthage and Warsaw, the neigh- 
boring towns, wore the look of military camps. A 
large body of Missourians were said to have joined 
the Warsaw forces, and five pieces of cannon and 
other arms had been forwarded to that point from 



**THE MOliMON PROPHET 'S TRAGEDY." 63 

Quincy and other places. The *^ Warsaw SignaP' 
advocated the massacre of the whole Mormon com- 
munity, and both at Warsaw and Carthage resolu- 
tions to that effect were passed by acclamation . 

The situation became so serious that the Prophet 
felt compelled to take effectual means to prevent the 
threatened assault and massacre. On the 18th of 
June, in his capacity of Mayor, he proclaimed Nau- 
voo under martial law, and called out the Legion to 
defend the city. In his last address to the soldiers 
and his fellow citizens, the lion-hearted Lieutenant- 
General said: ''I call God and angels to witness 
that 1 have unsheathed my sword with a firm and un- 
alterable determination that this people shall have 
their legal rights, and be protected from mob 
violence, or my blood shall be spilt upon the ground 
like water, and my body consigned to the silent 
tomb. While I live I will never tamely submit to the 
dominion of cursed mobocracy.'' 

Up to June 21st, no word was received at Nau- 
voo from Governor Ford, though he had been ap- 
pealed to for advice and assistance at the very be- 
ginning of the trouble. The placing of the city 
under martial law — an act construed as ' 'treason" — 
was a dernier ressort which the Governor had ad- 
vised in view of just such an emergency as had now 
arisen. Doubtless Ford thought of this when, as an 
historian, he penned the following lines, disposing of 
the question of treason as relating to the Mormon 
leaders : * 'Their actual guiltiness of the charge would 
depend upon circumstances. If their opponents had 



64 **THE MOKMON PROPHET's TEAGEDY.'' 

been seeking to put the law in force in good faith, 
and nothing more, then an array of military force in 
open resistance to the posse comitatus'^ and the mili- 
tia of the State, most probably would have amounted 
to treason. But if these opponents merely intended 
to use the powers of the law, the militia of the State, 
and the posse comitatus as cat's-paws to compass 
the possession of their persons for the purpose of 
murdering them afterwards, as the sequel demon- 
strated the fact to be, it might well be doubted 
whether they were guilty of treason." 

To this be it added that the leaders at Nauvoo 
did not array their military force against the powers 
of the County and the State, but against an armed 
mob that was threatening the massacre of an entire 
community. Just so soon as the Governor arrived 
on the scene and took command of the troops con- 
centrated at Carthage, the aspect of affairs under- 
went a complete transformation, theoretically, and 
the Mormons loyally changed front in conformity 
thereto. The Governor demanded that martial law 
at Nauvoo be abolished, and was immediately 
obeyed. He also required that the Mayor, the mem- 
bers of the City Council, and all persons concerned 
in the destruction of the "Expositor'' press, come to 
Carthage to be tried. This demand was likewise 
complied with, though not quite so promptly. For a 
few hours the Prophet hesitated ; life was still dear to 
him, and he felt, as he had felt all along, that if he 



* Power of the County. 



''the mormon prophet's tragedy." 65 

went to Carthage he would never return alive. On 
the night of the 22nd he and his brother Hyrum, 
with a few friends, crossed the Mississippi and started 
for the Rocky Mountains ; but a message from home 
intercepted him, inducing his return. Said he: ''We 
are going back to be butchered,'' and resigned him- 
self to his fate. 



the prophet surrenders and goes to CARTHAGE. 

Having delivered up, at the Governor's demand, 
the arms of the Nauvoo Legion, the Prophet and the 
Patriarch, with sixteen others, on the evening of the 
24th set out for Carthage. They arrived there about 
midnight, — the distance was eighteen miles, — and 
were immediately surrounded by armed ruffians, 
yelling like demons in their exultation over the 
peaceable surrender of their intended victims. Some 
of the soldiers — notably the Carthage Greys — were 
very abusive and threatened to shoot the unoffend- 
ing prisoners. Such was the character and morale 
of the posse comitatus, which the Nauvoo authori- 
ties were charged with "resisting." Governor Ford 
pacified the would-be assassins and the threatened 
murder was postponed. To the Prophet and his fel- 
low captives he pledged his honor and the faith of 
the State of Illinois, that they should be protected 
from violence and given a fair trial . 

On the afternoon of the 25th the defendants were 
arraigned before Justice Eobert F. Smith, a captain 
in the Carthage Greys. All were admitted to bail, — 



66 '*THE MORMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY.'' 

not ** discharged," as Mr. Hay asserts. This was 
on the charge of "riot." Almost immediately Joseph 
and Hyrum Smith were arresied for ''treason," and 
thrust into Carthage jail. John Taylor, Willard 
Richards and a few other friends were allowed to ac- 
company them to prison. It was the beginning of 
the end. The plot was fast consummating. "The 
law cannot reach them," said their conspiring mur- 
derers, "but powder and ball shall." 

"The prospect was still not bad for them," re- 
marks Mr. Hay, with a covert sneer. "The sheriff 
was their friend. They were sure of a favorable jury. 
The Governor — a man of the best intentions, that 
accomplished nothing but patching the infernal pave- 
ment — had come over to Hancock County to i3reserve 
law and order. The Smiths were sure of a speedy 
trial and acquittah And the whole tiresome play was 
to begin again. There was only one way of getting 
out of the groove. The Deusex Machina,'^ who alone 
could settle matters, was the mob." This much 
frankness is refreshing. 

GOVERNOR ford's BROKEN PLEDGE. 

Next morning — June 26th — Governor Ford 
granted an interview to the Prophet, coming to the 
prison for that purpose. During the conversation 
Joseph charged him with knovvdng positively that he 
and his brother v>^ere innocent of treason, and de- 
clared that the Governor had advised him to use the 



The Deity outside the Machine. 



"the MOiiMON pkophet's tkagedy.'' 67 

Legion just as he had done, in the event of a threat- 
ened mobocratic assault upon Nauvoo. As to the 
"Expositor" affair, Mayor Smith stated that he was 
perfectly willing to be tried again, and if found 
guilty to make suitable reparation. That was a mat- 
ter for courts to decide, not for mobs to settle. The 
Governor, at parting, renewed his promise that the 
prisoners should be protected, and pledged his word 
that if he went to Nauvoo, as ho contemplated, he 
would take the Prophet with him. 

The promise was not kept. Governor Ford, 
though a well-meaning man, like Pilate of old, was 
weak and vac illating; insomuch that he was a mere 
tool, without intending to be, in the hands of those 
who were plotting murder. He did go to Nauvoo, 
the next day, but did not take the Prophet with him, 
being persuaded by a council of his officers, that it 
"would be highly inexpedient and dangerous." It 
was while the Governor was at Nauvoo, harangu- 
ing the citizens, that the Carthage jail crime was 
committed. 

LAST HK)UES OF THE PKOPHET. 

On the afternoon of the 26th the Prophet and 
the Patriarch were arraigned before Justice Smith 
at the Court House, on the charge of treason. 
Their request for time to obtain witnesses was reluct- 
antly granted, and the court then adjourned until 
noon of the 27th. Subsequently the military justice, 
without notifying the prisoners, postponed the trial 
until the 29th. The last night of the brothers Joseph 



68 *'the mormon prophet's tragedy/' 

and Hyrum on earth, was passed in the society of 
their friends John Taylor, Willard Richards, John 
S. Fullmer, Stephen Alarkham and Dan Jones. 

Next day — the fatal 27th — Messrs Fulmer, 
Markham and Jones were excluded from the jail, 
and the four leaders selected for the sacrifice were 
left alone. One of these, Willard Richards, was not 
even charged with crime, yet he, too, was marked 
for death. The captives cheered each other with 
sacred songs, and by preaching in turn to the 
guards, some of whom were softened in their hearts, 
and were promptly relieved from duty, sterner men 
being put in their place. During the day Cyrus H. 
Wheelock was permitted to enter the prison, and be- 
fore leaving he managed secretly to slip a small 
pistol — a pepper-box revolver — into Joseph's pocket. 
This weapon and a single- barreled pistol left by Mr. 
Fullmer, with two stout walking canes, were their 
only means of defense against the horde of armed 
assassius that soon after descended upon the jail. 

THE MURDERERS AND THEIR CRIME. 

1 will let Mr. Hay disclose the identity of the 
murderers, and tell the story of the crime: 

"There was a large body of militia at Carthage, 
and a small regiment at Warsaw. The Governor, 
not knowing how to employ their idle hands, ordered 
them to rendezvous at Golden 's Point. He sent 
Singleton to Nauvoo to take command of the legion 
raised by Smith. Singleton, on his arrival, found 
two thousand men armed and equipped. Though a 



**THE MORMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY. '^ 69 

little dismayed by the apparition, he inspected them 
and reported to the Governor. 

*' During this day or two the Governor seemed 
plagued by the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet. He 
changed his mind every hour, with the best inten- 
tions. When the troops had started for Golden' s 
Point, he began to doubt, as he well might. They 
were going to Nauvoo to search for ^bougs' (a noun 
which in that day was used to denote an ingenious 
imitation of the current coin, manufactured in the 
city of the Saints), and to overawe the Mormons by 
a calm display of force. What if they searched for 
other things, and did not content themselves with a 
calm display! These thoughts so agitated Governor 
Ford, that he wrote an order on the 27th, counter- 
manding former orders, and disbanding the militia. 
He then mounted his horse and rode to Nauvoo, to 
deliver a firm and paternal address to the Mormons. 
All this was done with the best intentions. 

^*0n the morning of the 27th of June, the regi- 
ment of Colonel Levi Williams started from Warsaw 
in obedience to the call of the Governor to rendez- 
vous at Golden 's Point, a settlem.ent in the vicinity 
of Nauvoo. They went out in high glee, fully ex- 
pecting to march to the city of the Saints, and not 
doubting that before they left it, some occasion would 
arise which would make it necessary to remove this 
standing scandal from the face of the earth . There were 
none but words of law and order on their lips ; but 
every man clearly understood that Nauvoo was to be 
destroyed before they returned. A public meeting 



70 *^THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TEAGEDY." 

in Warsaw had unanimously ''Resolved, that we will 
forthwith proceed to Nauvoo and exterminate the 
city and its people ; ' a manifesto which seemed too 
peppery even for the palate of Mr. Sharp, editor of 
the Signal^ who, when he published it, added the 
saving clause, ^if necessary.' *0f course it will 
be necessary,' said these law-abiding militia-men, as 
they marched out of Warsaw on the Nauvoo road. 

"Order reigned in Warsaw — for the men were 
all gone. The whole male adult population, with 
trifling exceptions, were in Williams' regiment. 
Among the captains were William N. Grover, after- 
wards a distinguished lawyer of St Louis, and United 
States attorney for Missouri — an eminently respect- 
able and conservative man ; Thomas C. Sharp, editor 
of the Signal^ who also on this day sowed the last of 
his wild oats, and was afterwards principal of the 
public school, and greatly esteemed as county judge; 
Jacob C. Davis, then State Senator, afterwards 
member of Congress from that district. 

"Thev arrived near noon at some deserted shan- 
ties, about seven miles from Warsaw, that had been 
built and abandoned in that flurry and collapse of 
internal improvement that passed over the State in 
1838. There they were met by Mr. David Matthews, 
a well-known citizen of Warsaw, who had ridden 
rapidly from Carthage with an order from the Gov- 
ernor, disbanding the regiment. The Governor, fear- 
ing he could not control the inflammable material he 
had gathered together, had determined to scatter it 
again. 



(( 



THE MOEMON PEOPHET's TKAGEDY.'' 71 



* 'Colonel Williams read the Governor's order. 
Some of the anti- Mormon warriors, blessed with robust 
western appetites, looked at the smi, and concluded 
that they could get home by dinner time, and under 
the influence of this inspiring idea started off at 
quick-step. Captain Grover soon found himself 
without a company. Captain Aldrich essayed a 
speech calling for volunteers for Carthage. *He did 
not make a fair start,' says the chronicle, 'and 
Sharp came up and took it off his hands.' Sharp, 
being a spirited and impressive talker, soon had a 
respectable squad about him. Captain Davis, on the 
contrary, was sorely perplexed. It was heavy 
weather for him. He was a professional politician, 
and deaily loved both Mormon and anti-Mormon 
votes. He was so backward in coming forward that 
his company left him in disgust, and followed the 
fiery Grover, whose company had gone home to din- 
ner. Davis still could not make up his mind to go 
home, but 'got into Calvin Cole's wagon and followed 
the boys at a distance;' so that he had at last the 
luck to be in at the closing scene, and the honor to 
be indicted with the rest. The speeches of Grover 
and Sharp were rather vague ; the purpose of murder 
does not seem to have been hinted. They protested 
against 'being made the tools and puppets of Tommy 
Ford.' They were going to Carthage to see the 
boys, and talk things over. Some of the cooler 
heads, such as Dr. Hay,* surgeon of the regiment, 



* Probably Colonel Hay's own father, Dr. Charles Hay. 



72 '*THE MORMON PEOPHET's TRAGEDY." 

denounced the proceeding and went at once back to 
Warsaw. 

** While they were wpJting at the shanties, a 
courier came in from the Carthage Grays. It is im- 
possible at this day to declare exactly the purport of 
his message. It is usually reported and believed 
that he brought an assurance from the officers of his 
company that they would be found on guard at the 
jail where the Smiths were confined; that they would 
make no real resistance, — merely enough to save ap- 
pearances. 

*'This message was not communicated to the 
men. They follow<^d their leaders off on the road to 
Carthage, with rather vague intentions. They were 
annoyed at the prospect of their picnic coming eo 
readily to a close, at losing the fun of sacking Nau- 
voo, at having to go home without material for a sin- 
gle romance. Nearly one hundred and fifty started 
with their captains, but they gradually dwindled in 
number to seventy- five. These trudged along under 
the fierce summer sun of the prairies towards the 
town where the cause of all the trouble and confus- 
sion of the last few years awaited them. They sang 
on the way a rude parody of a camp- meeting hymn 
called in the West the 'Hebrew children:' 

"Where uow is the Prophet Joseph? 
Where now is the Prophet Joseph? 
Where now is the Prophet Joseph? 
Safe in Carthage jail." 

The farther they walked the more the idea im- 
pressed itself upon them that now was the time to 



ii 



THE MORMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY.'' 73 



finish the matter totally. The iinavowed design of 
the leaders commimicated itself magnetically to the 
men, until the entire company became fused into one 
mass of bloodthirsty energy. By an excess of pre- 
caution, they did not go directly into the town, but 
made a long detour, so as to come in by the road 
leading from Nauvoo. 

''The jail where the Smiths were confined is 
situated at the extreme northwestern edge of the dis- 
mal village, at the end of a long, ill-kept street 
whose middle is a dusty road, and whose sides are 
gay with stramonium and dog-fennel. As the aven- 
gers came in sight of the mean-looking building that 
held their prey, the sleeping tiger that lurks in every 
human heart sprang up in theirs, and they quick- 
ened their pace to a run. There was no need of 
orders, — no possibility of checking them now. The 
guards were hustled away from the door, good- 
naturedly resisting until they were carefully disarmed. 
Their commander. Lieutenant Frank Worrell, after- 
wards gave this testimony on the trial, which we 
copy for its curious and cynical honlioniie : 

'' 'I was one of the guards at the jail. Saw 
Smith when he was killed. Satv none of the defend- 
ants at the jail! Suppose there were one or two hundred 
there. They stayed three or four minutes. They 
formed in front of the jail and made a rush. Knetv 
none that came up, * * Saw Smith die, — 
was within ten feet of him. * * * p^j,_ 
haps a minute after he fell I saw him die . * * 
I was pushed and shoved some fifty feet. 



* 



74 ''the mokmon prophet's tragedy.'' 

* * Did not see Sharp, Grover, or Davis. It 
was so crowded I could not see much, I know about 
one third of the men in the county, Uit none at the 
jail. I miglit have been some scared.'' 

''it would be difficult to ima.^ine anything cooler 
than this quiet perjury to screen a murder. Yet the 
strangest part of this strange story is that Frank 
Worrell was a generous young fellow, and the men 
with whom he carried out the ghastly comedy of at- 
tack and resistance at the door of the prison — Sharp 
and Grover — were good citizens, educated and irre- 
proachable, who still live to enjoy the respect and 
esteem of all who know them. There is but one 
force mighty enough in the world to twist such 
minds and consciences so fearfully awry, and that 
is the wild suspicion bred of civil strife. A few 
months of this minature war in Hancock County had 
sufficed to possess many of the prominent actors 
with the spirit of demons; and in the mind of any anti- 
Mormon there was nothing more criminal in the shoot- 
ing of Smith than in the slaying of a wolf or panther. 

"This jolly, good-natured Worrell was himself 
murdered by Mormon assassins not loug after. He 
was riding with a friend. A shot was heard from a 
thicket. 'That was a rifle,' said the friend. 'Yes, 
and I've got it,' said Worrell, coolly. He fell from 
his horse and died. I have seen, as a child, his 
grave at Warsaw. A rude, wooden head-board, 
bearing this legend: 'He who is without enemies is 
unworthy of friends,' — not very orthodox, but per- 
haps as true as most epitaphs. 



u 



THE MOKMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY." 75 



U' 



'While Worrell, little thinking of his tombstone, 
was strug2:ling: with his friendlj^ assailants, as many 
as the narrow entry would hold had rushed into the 
open door and up the cramped little stairs. Smith 
and his brother had been that day removed from 
their cells and given comparative liberty in a large, 
airy room on the first floor above. This afternoon 
they were receiving the visits of two Mormon breth- 
ren, Richards and Taylor. They heard the row at 
the door and the rush on the stairs, and instinctively 
barred their door by pressing their weight against 
it. The mob fired at the door. Hyrum Smith fell, 
exclaiming, 'I'm a dead man.' Taylor c;awled un- 
der the bed, with a bullet in the calf of his leg. 
Richards hid himself behind the opening door, in 
mortal terror. He afterwards lied terribly about the 
affair, saying he stood calmly in the center of the 
room, warding off the bullets with a consecrated 
wand. 

''Joe Smith died bravely. He stood by the 
jamb of the door and fired four shots, bringing his 
man down every time. He shot an Irishman named 
Wills, who was in the affair from his congenital love 
of a brawl, in the arm; Gallagher, a Southerner from 
the Mississippi Bottom, in the face; Yoorhees, a 
half -grown hobbledehoy from Bear Creek, in the 
shoulder; and another gentleman, whose name I will 
not mention, as he is prepared to prove an alibi, and 
besides stands six feet two in his moccasins. 

"Smith had two loaded six- barrelled revolvers 
in his room. How a man on trial for capital offenses 



76 *'the mokmon peophet's teagedy." 

came to be supplied with such luxuries is a mystery 
that perhaps only one man could fully have solved; 
and as General Deming, the Jack-Mormon sheriff, 
died soon after, and left no ex^Dlanation of the mat- 
ter, investigation is effectually baffled. But the four 
shots which I have chronicled, and the two which 
had no bullet, exhausted one pistol, and the enemy 
gave Smith no time to use the other. Severely 
wounded as he was, he ran to the window, which was 
open to receive the fresh June air, and half leaped, 
half fell, into the jail yard below. With his last dy- 
ing energies he gathered himself up, and leaned in a 
sitting posture against the rude stone well- curb. His 
stricken condition, his vague wandering glances, ex- 
cited no pity in the mob thirsting for his life. They 
had not seen the handsome fight he had made in the 
jail; there was no appeal to chivalry (there is chival- 
ry on the borders, as in all semi- barbarous regions) . 
A squad of Missourians who were standing by the 
fence levelled their pieces at him, and, before they 
could see him again for the smoke they made, Joe 
Smith was dead. 

^'Meanwhile, the Carthage Greys were approach- 
ing. They had been called out half an hour before, 
and formed on the Court-house square, by Captain 
Robert Smith, with great precision and deliberation 
that give rise, under the circumstances, to somewhat 
wide conjecture. Captain Smith had not previously 
been regarded as a martinet, but this afternoon he 
could have given points to a Potsdam corporal. He 
stopped his company half a dozen times, to rem on- 



*'the mormon peophet's teagedy." 77 

strate against defects in their alignment; and it was 
owing to his extreme conscientiousness about disci- 
pline that they arrived at the jail when all was over. 
Let me add that Captain Smith (for it seemed fated 
that everyone connected with this affair should have 
greatness thrust upon him) became in the great war 
General Robert F. Smith, and marched his troops 
from Hancock County to the Atlantic with more 
speed, if less science, than he displayed in leading 
his squad that day from the Court-house to the 
jail. 

*'The moment the work was done, the calmness of 
horror succeeded the fever of fanatical rage. The 
assassins hurried away from the jail, and took the 
road to Warsaw in silence and haste. They went 
home at a killing pace over the wide, dusty prairie. 
Warsaw is eighteen miles from Carthage ; the Smiths 
were killed at half-past five: at a quarter before 
eight the returning crowd began to drag their weary 
limbs through the main street of Warsaw, — at such 
an astounding rate of speed had the lash of their own 
thoughts driven them. 

"The town was instantly put in such attitude of 
defense as its limited means permitted. The women 
and children were ferried across the river to a village 
on the Missouri shore. The men kept guard night 
and day in the hazel thickets around the town. Ev- 
rybody expected sudden and exemplary vengeance 
from the Mormons. 

"Nothing of the kind took place. The appalling 
disaster that had fallen upon the Church gave rise 



78 ''the mokmon peophet's tragedy." 

to no spirit of revenge. It was long before the Mor- 
mons recovered from the stupor of their terror and 
despair. A delegation went to Carthage to receive 
their dead. They brought them home and buried 
them with honors becoming the generals of the le- 
gion. The seceders, panic-stricken, fled from Nau- 
voo and never returned." 

Aside from the flippant heartlessness of the 
foregoing narrative, the spirit and style of which 
would better become the description of a picnic than 
of the terrible tragedy here chronicled, I have little 
fault to find with the story in the main. Some of 
the statements are open to criticism, but the accu- 
racy of the general account I will not question. 
Let me ask, however, what Mr. Hay would have 
thought, if some cultured. Christian author, south 
of Mason and Dixon's line, on a certain sad morn- 
ing in April, 1865, had written thi^s of the as- 
sassination of the President of the United States: 
"Abe Lincoln was killed at Ford's Theatre, last 
night; he died bravely; his murderers are good citi- 
zens, educated and irreproachable, who still live to 
enjoy the respect and esteem of all who know 
them." 

The admiration expressed for the ^ 'jolly, good- 
natured Worrell," that "generous young fellow," 
who, with the murderous-minded Sharp and other 
"irreproachables," there "sowed his wild oats," 
irrigating them with the blood of innocent men, 
speaks for itself, without any comment of mine. 
Worrell was not killed by assassins, as claimed. He 



**THE MORMON PEOPHET's TKAGEDY.'' 79 

lost his life in an encounter between a mob and a 
sheriff's posse, the latter summoned from Nauvoo 
(after the posse comitatus had failed to respond to 
the call of that officer) to put down rioters who were 
pillaging and burning Mormon homes. Worrell was 
shot by order of Sheriff Backenstos, a non-Mormon, 
who commanded one of the posse to fire upon him. 
Mr. Hay omits to mention that the mob which 
assaulted Carthage jail had previously blackened 
their faces, in order to conceal their identity. His 
gratuitous fling at Sheriff Deming (who furnished no 
weapons to the prisoners) is as unjust as his slight- 
ing reference to Willard Richards, whom he accuses 
of cowardice and falsehood in connection with the 
massacre. Who it was that misrepresented the af- 
fair will be evident to the reader after perusing Dr. 
Richards' terse, graphic, and withal modest nar- 
rative, written at the time upon the scene of the 
tragedy, and published originally in the "Times and 
Seasons" at Nauvoo. It is entitled 

'*TWO MINUTES IN JAIL: 

"A shower of musket balls were thrown up the 
stairway against the door of the prison in the sec- 
ond story, followed by many rapid footsteps. 

* 'While Generals Joseph and Hyrum Smith, Mr. 
Taylor and myself, who were in the front chamber, 
closed the door of our room against the entry at the 
head of the stairs, and placed ourselves against it, 
there being no lock on the door, and no catch that 
was useable. 



80 Vthe mormon prophet's tragedy.'' 

^^The door is a common panel, and as soon as 
we beard the feet at the stairs head, a ball was sent 
through the door, which passed between us, and 
showed that our enemies were desperadoes, and we 
must change our position. 

"General Joseph Smith, Mr. Taylor and myself, 
sprang back to the front part of the room, and Gen- 
eral Hyrum Smith retreated two-thirds across the 
chamber, in front of and facing the door. 

"A ball was sent through the door, which hit 
Hyrum on the side of the nose, when he fell back- 
wards, extended at length, without moving his feet. 

"From the holes in his vest (the day was warm, 
and none had their coats on but myself), panta- 
loons, drawers and shirt, it appears evident that a 
ball must have been thrown from without, through 
the window, which entered his back on the right 
side, and passing through lodged against his watch, 
which was in his ]'ight vest pocket, completely pul- 
verizing the crybtal and face, tearing off the hands, 
and mashing the whole body of the watch. At the 
same time the ball from the door entered his nose. 

"As he struck the floor he exclaimed emphati- 
cally, 'I'm a dead man.' Joseph looked towards 
him and responded, *0h, dear. Brother Hyrum!' 
and opening the door two or three inches with his 
left hand, discharged one barrel of a f?ix shooter 
(pistol) at random in the entry, from whence a ball 
grazed Hyrum' s breast and entering his throat passed 
into his head, while the other muskets were aimed at 
him, and some balls hit him. 



'*THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY." 81 

V. 

' 'Joseph coDtinued snapping his revolver round 
the casing of the door into the space as before, 
three barrels of which missed fire; while Mr. Tay- 
lor, with a walking stick stood, by his side, and 
knocked down the bayonets and muskets which were 
constantly discharging through the doorway, while I 
stood by him ready to lend any assistance, with 
another stick, but could not come within striking 
distance without going directly before the muzzles of 
the guns. 

''When the revolver failed, we had no more fire- 
arms, and expected an immediate rush of the mob, 
and the doorway full of muskets half way in the 
room, and no hope but instant death from within. 

''Mr. Taylor rushed into the window, which is 
some fifteen or twenty feet from the ground. When 
his body was nearly on a balance, a ball from the 
door within entered his leg, and a ball from without 
struck his watch, a patent lever, in his vest pocket, 
near the left breast, and smashed it into 'pie,' leav- 
ing the hands standing at 5 o'clock, 16 minutes and 
26 seconds ; the force of which ball threw him back 
on the floor, and he rolled under the bed which stood 
by his side, where he lay motionless, the mob con- 
tinuing to fire upon him, cutting away a piece of 
flesh from his left hip as large as a man's hand, and 
were hindered only by my knocking down muzzles 
with a stick, while they continued to reach their 
guns into the room, probably left-handed, and aimed 
their discharges so far round as almost to reach us 
in the corner of the room, to where we retreated and 

6 



82 '*THE MOKMON PKOPHET's TRAGEDY." 

dodged, and then I recommenced the attack with my 
stick. 

** Joseph attempted, as the last resort, to leap 
the same window from whence Mr. Tajdor fell, when 
two balls pierced him from the door, and one en- 
tered the right breast from without, and he fell 
outward, exclaiming, 'O Lord, my God!' As his feet 
went out of the window, my head went in, the balls 
whistling all around. He fell on his left side, a dead 
man. 

"At this instant the cry was raised, 'He's leaped 
the window ! ' and the mob on the stairs and in the 
entry ran out. 

"I withdrew from the window, thinking it of no 
use to leap out on a hundred bayonets, then around 
General Smith's body. 

"Not satisfied with this I again reached my head 
out of the window, and watched some seconds to see 
if there were any signs of life, regardless of my own, 
determined to see the end of him I loved. Being 
fully satisfied that he was dead, with a hundred men 
near the body and more coming round the corner of 
the jail, and expecting a return to our room, I rushed 
towards the prison door, at the head of the stairs, 
and through the entry from whence the firing had 
proceeded, to learn if the doors into the prison were 
open. 

"When near the entry, Mr. Taylor cried out, 
'Take me.' I pressed my way until I found all the 
doors unbarred; returning instantly, I caught Mr. Tay- 
lor under my arm, and rushed by the stairs into the 



**THE MORMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY.'' 83 

dungeon, or inner prison, stretched him on the floor 
and covered him with a bed in such a manner as not 
likely to be perceived, expecting an immediate return 
of the mob. 

**I said to Mr. Taylor, *This is a hard case to 
lay you on the floor, but if your wounds are not fatal, 
I want you to live to tell the story.' I expected to 
be shot the next moment, and stood before the door 
awaiting the onset." 

Nothing is said here of "warding off the bullets 
with a consecrated wand." Willard Richards never 
made such a statement, nor did any friend of his 
ever make it in his behalf. It is a fair sample of 
anti-Mormon unfairness; one of the hearsays adopted 
by Mr. Hay as a fact; one of the fictions with which 
his narrative is filled. 

What Dr. Richards expected and awaited almost 
happened. While the heroically cool and self-pos- 
sessed man was caring for his wounded friend in the 
inner part of the prison, a portion of the mob again 
rushed up stairs to finish the fiendish work already 
more than half done. Finding only the dead body 
of Hyrum Smith in the front apartment, and suppos- 
ing the other prisoners to have escaped, they were 
again descending the stairs when a loud cry was 
heard, 'The Mormons are coming!' Thinking the 
inhabitants of Nauvoo were upon them, to avenge the 
murder of the Prophet, the whole band of assassins 
broke and fled, seeking refuge in the neighboring 
forest. Their grotesque fear was shared by the peo- 
ple of Carthage in general, who abandoned their 



84 **THE MOEMON PKOPHET's TKAGED\/' 

homes and fled pell mell, terrified by the vain thought 
of a wrathful visitation from the City of the Saints. 

Equally groundless with the assertion relative to 
Dr. Eiehards, is the one attributing "terror and des- 
pair" to the betraj^ed and stricken community at 
Nauvoo. There was no terror; there was no des- 
pair. It was a Grod-fearing people, possessing their 
souls with characteristic patience and resignation, 
leaving vengeance to Him who has said, "I will re- 
pay." Had the Mormons wanted blood for blood, — 
though a hecatomb of such lives as had robbed them 
of their Prophet and their Patriarch would have been 
no compensation, — the murderous wretches would 
have bit the dust, though it had taken the whole 
power of the dreaded Legion to bring them low. 
Had there been any ''Danites," they would have 
done their destructive work then and there. If the 
Mormons had been the ''bad neighbors," turbulent 
and troublesome, that they were falsely represented 
as being, all Hancock County would have been devas- 
tated by them in a reckless fury of retaliation. But as 
Mr. Hay says, "nothing of the kind took place. The 
appalling disaster that had fallen upon the Church 
gave rise to no spirit of revenge." And there is 
nothing that so successfully confutes the lying stories 
of the rascally banditti who slandered the Church and 
its leaders in order to make more easy the horrid 
murder they had planned, than the god-like self-con- 
trol exhibited by the Latter-day Saints in that su- 
preme hour of trial. 

Just here will be a good place to insert another 



*^THE MOKMON PROPHET's TEAGEDY." 85 

paragraph from Ford's History of Illinois, in which 
the author speaks of the cunning tactics of the vill- 
ainous conspirators, who found it necessary to black- 
en the fair fame of the Mormo;i people, as a prelude 
to the assassination of their Prophet. 

**A system of excitement and agitation was art- 
fully planned and executed with tact. It consisted 
in spreading reports and rumors of the most fearful 
character. As example- ;— On the morning before 
my arrival at Carthage, 1 was awakened at an early 
hour by the frightful report, which was asserted 
with confidence and apparent consternation, thac 
the Mormons had already commenced the work of 
burning, destruction and murder; and that every man 
capable of bearing arms was instantly wanted at 
Carthage, for the protection of the county. We lost 
no time in starting; but when we arrived at Carthage 
we could hear no mor^ concerning this story. Again: 
During the few days that the militia were encamped 
at Carthage, frequent applic^ition- were made to me 
to send a force here and a force there, and a force 
all about the country, to prevent murders, robberies, 
and larcenies, which, it was said, were threatened by 
the Mormons. No such forces were sent; nor were 
any such offenses committed at that time, except the 
stealing of some provisions, and there was never the 
least proof that this was done by a Mormon. Again: 
On my late visit to Hancock County, I was informed 
by some of their violent enemies, that the larcenies 
of the Mormons had become unusually numerous and 
insufferable. They indeed admitted that but little 



86 '*THE MOEMON PKOPHET'S TEAGEDY. 



jj 



had been done in this way in their immediate vicin- 
ity. But they insisted that sixteen horses had been 
stolen by the Mormons in one night, near Lima, in 
the County of Adams. At the close of the expedi- 
tion, I called at this same town of Lima, and upon 
inquiry was told that no horses had been stolen in 
that neighborhood, but that sixteen horses had been 
stolen in one night in Hancock County. This last 
informant, being told of the Hancock story, again 
changed the venue to another distant settlement, in 
the northern edge of Adams." 

TKIAL AND ACQUITTAL OF THE MURDEKEKS. 

*^The reaction now began." (I am again quoting 
from Mr. Hay.) ''At the August elections the Jack- 
Mormon ticket, as it was called, bearing candidates 
favorable to the Mormons, was chosen by an unex- 
ampled majority. The press of the State was unani- 
mous in its condemnation of the Warsaw men, with a 
few exceptions, when special correspondents had vis- 
ited the county. These were almost invariably apolo- 
gists of the killing. It is curious to note tlie sudden 
change of the anti-Mormon journals from the fierce 
and aggressive tone which they held the week before, 
to the sullen attitude of self-defense they assumed 
the week after the Carthage tragedy. Here is an 
extract from an article by Sharp in the 'Signal,' 
which may show how much easier it is to kill a man 
than to justify the killmg: 

" 'The St. Louis 'Gazette' says that the men 
that killed the Smiths were a pack of cowards. Now 



**THE MORMON PROPHET'S TRAGEDY.*^ 87 

our view of the matter is, that instead of cowardice, 
they exhibited foolhardy courage, for they must have 
known or thought that they would bring down on 
themselves the vengeance of the Mormons. True, 
the act of an armed body going to the jail and killing 
prisoners does appear at first sight dastardly, but we 
look at it as though these men were the execu- 
tioners of justice ; and their act is no more cowardly 
than is the act of the hangman in stretching up a 
defenseless convict who is incapable of resistance. 
If any other mode could have been devised, or any 
other time selected, it would have been better; but, 
as we have heard others say, we are satisfied that it 
is done, and care not to philosophize on the modus 
operandi. ' 

* 'It was impossible that the matter should be 
allowed to pass entirely unnoticed by the law. Be- 
sides, Governor Ford, who considered the murder a 
personal disrespect to himself, was really anxious to 
bring the perpetrators to justice. Bills of indictment 
were found at the October term of court against Levi 
Williams, Mark Aldrich, Jacob C. Davis, William N. 
G-rover, Ihomas C. Sharp, John Wills, William 
Voorhees, William Gallagher and one Allen. They 
were based on the testimony of two idle youths, 
named Brackenbury and Daniels, who had accom- 
panied the expedition from Warsaw to Carthage on 

the 27th of June, and had seen the whole affair.'' 

* * * * 

''The next May, all the defendants appeared, 
according to agreement, to stand their trial. They 



88 **THE MOKMON PROPHET 'S TRAGEDY.'' 

began by filing their affidavit that the county com- 
missioners who selected the array of jurors for the 
week were prejudiced against them ; that the sheriff 
and his deputies were unfitted by prejudice to select 
the talesmen that might be required. They there- 
fore entered a motion to quash the array of jurors, 
to set aside the sheriff and his deputies, and to ap- 
point elisors to select a jmy for the case. After 
argument, this was done. The elisors presented 
ninety- six men, before twelve were found ignorant 
enough and indifferent enough to act as jurors. 

''A large number of witnesses were examined, 
but nothing was elicited against the accused from 
any except Brackenbury, Daniels, and a girl named 
Eliza Jane Graham." 

These witnesses, according to the narrator, were 
not considered credible. Messrs. Brackenbury and 
Daniels contradicted each other, he claims. More- 
over, they had committed the unpardonable sin of 
joining the Mormon Church pending the delivery of 
their testimony in court. "The evidence of Miss 
Graham," he continues, ironically, "delivered with 
the impetuosity of her sex, was all that could be de- 
sired — and more, too. She had assisted in feeding 
the hungry mob at the Warsaw House, as they came 
straggling in from Carthage, and she could remem- 
ber where every man sat, and what he said, and how 
he said it. Unfortunately, she remembered too 
much. No one accused her of willful perjury. But 
her nervous and sensitive character had been power- 
fully impressed by the influence of Smith, and, 



*^THE MOEMON PllOPBEx's TRAGEDY." 89 

brooding coi stantly upon his death, she came at last 
to regard her own fancies and suspicions as positive 
occurrences. A few alibis so discredited her evi- 
dence, that it was held to prove nothing more than 
her own honest and half insane zeal. 

''The case was closed. There was not a man on 
the jury, in the court, in the county, that did not 
know the defendants had done murder. But it was 
not proven, and the verdict of not guilty was right 
in law. 

"And you cannot find in this generation an orig- 
inal inhabitant of Hancock County who will not 
stoutly sustain the verdict." 

This comment upon the original inhabitants of 
Hancock County is sufficiently severe, without further 
criticism. It has but one fault — it is not true. But 
let that pass. There are some facts connected with 
that gross miscarriage of justice which Mr. Hay 
fails to chronicle. The trial took place at Carthage, 
beginning on the 19th of May, 1845. Sixty names 
had been presented to the Grand Jury of the Circuit 
Court, as being implicated in the crime, but only 
nine men had been indicted. These nine have 
been named. One of them, Levi Williams, the lead- 
er of the mob, was not only a Colcnel of militia, 
he was also a Baptist preacher, and, of course, an 
* 'eminently respectable and conservative' ' man. Judge 
E^ichard M. Young presided at the trial, and James 
H. Ralston and Josiah Lamborn conducted the pros- 
ecution. The defense was represented by William 
A. Richardson, O. H. Browning, Calvin A. Warren, 



90 *'the moemon pkophet's tkagedy/' 

Archibald Williams, O. C. Skinner, and Thomas 
Morrison. The panel of the trial jury was as follows: 
Jesse Griffits, Joseph Jones, William Robertson, 
William Smith, Joseph Massey, Silas Griffits, Jona- 
than Foy, Solomon J. Hill, James Gittings, F. M. 
Walton, Jabez A. Beebe, and Gilmore Callison. The 
trial lasted until the 30th of May. During its pro- 
gress, Mr. Warren, of counsel for the defense, ar- 
gued, it is said, in the course of his plea, that if the 
prisoners were guilty of murder, then he himself 
was guilty; that it was the public opinion that the 
Smiths ought to be killed, and public opinion made 
the law; consequently it was not murder to kill them. 
Evidently this wretched piece of sophistry had weight 
with the jury in making up their verdict. 

Regarding the rightfulness of that verdict, there 
appears to be a marked variance of opinion between 
Mr. Hay and Governor Ford. The latter says: ''The 
Judge was compelled to admit the presence of armed 
bands, to browbeat and overawe the administration 
of justice." ''The Judge himself was in duress, and 
informed me that he did not consider his life secure 
any part of the time. The consequence was that the 
crowd had everything their own way." In the light 
of such statements as these, the verdict is easily ex- 
plained. The jury may have been "ignorant enough 
and indifferent enough" in the first place, as alleged; 
but they doubtless became well enough informed as 
to the fate that would befall them if their findings 
failed to please the mob, and were sufficiently inter- 
ested to provide against the perilous contingency. 



**THE MORMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY. '^ 91 

The perjured testimony of such witnesses as Lieuten- 
ant Worrell (given, as Mr. Hay admits, for the pur- 
pose of '^screening a murder,'') indicates some of 
the means emploj^ed to ''prove" the requisite num- 
ber of "alibis," by which the damaging testimony 
of the girl Graham was "discredited." Possibly 
some of the witnesses were as prudent as Mr. Hay 
confesses himself to be, when tempted to mention the 
name of a "gentleman" murderer who was "prepared 
to prove an alibi" and stood "six feet two in his 



moccasins." 



THE MORMON EXODUS. 

Emboldened by the outcome of the trial, the 
anti-Mormons pressed hard their advantage. Al- 
ready was the Nauvoo Charter repealed, and the law- 
less and oppressive acts that followed vindicated the 
foresight which had decreed the abatement of the libel- 
ous, mob-inciting "Expositor." The plotters con- 
tinued trumping up charges against the heads of 
the Church, notably President Brigham Young, and 
supplemented these vexatious proceedings with a de- 
liberate system of pillaging and house- burning; the 
victims of these dastardly outrages being the Mor- 
mon residents of Hancock County, no longer protect- 
ed by their Legion, which had been disbanded. 
Thomas Gregg, the anti-Mormon historian, whom no 
one will accuse of partiality for the other side, can- 
didly admits that these acts were absolutely unjusti- 
fiable; "acts," says he, "which had no warrant in 
law or order, and which cannot be reconciled with 



92 '^THE MOEMON PKOPHET's TKAGEDY.'^ 

any correct principles of reasoning, and which we 
then thought, and still think, were condemned by 
every consideration looking to good government; 
acts which had for their object, and which finally re- 
sulted in, the forcible expulsion of the Mormon peo- 
ple from the County.^' 

How different this fair and dignified comment 
from most of the statements here made by Mr. Hay, 
whose reckless bias charges upon "Mormon assas- 
sins" the justifiable killing of the man Worrell, one 
of the ring-leaders of those robbers and house- burn- 
ers. But Mr. Gregg lived among the scenes and the 
people whom he describes, and was old enough to 
comprehend the situation. He did not confine his 
researches as a historian to reading "as a child," in- 
scriptions on the tombstones of dead mobocrats, or 
listening to self -justifying stories from the lips of 
mobocrats still living. 

Mr. Gregg's impartial view was shared by other 
"original inhabitants of Hancock County," and by 
many citizens in various parts of the State. Hon. 
Josiah Lamborn, Attorney- General of Illinois, writ- 
ing to President Young, soon after the repeal of the 
Nauvoo Charter in January, 1845, says: "I have al- 
ways considered that your enemies have been prompt- 
ed b}^ political and religious prejudices, and by a de- 
sire for plunder and blood, more than for the com- 
mon good. By the repeal of your Charter, and by 
refusing all amendments and modific actions, our Leg- 
islature has given a kind of sanction to the barbarous 
manner in which you have been treated. * * * 



''the MOllMON PROrHET's TRAGEDY." 93 

It is truly a melancholy spectacle to witness the 
law-makers of a sovereign State condescending to 
pander to the vices, ignorance, and malevolence of a 
class of people who are at all times ready for riot, 
murder, and rebellion." 

Governor Ford, in a letter to President Young, 
dated April 8, 1845, made the following suggestion: 
"If you can get off by yourselves, you may enjoy 
peace; but, surrounded by such neighbors, I confess 
that I do not see the time when you will be permitted 
to enjoy quiet. I was informed by General Joseph 
Smith last summer, that he contemplated a removal 
West; and from what I learned from him and others 
at that time, I think if he had lived he would have 
begun to move in the matter before this time. I 
would be willing to exert all my feeble abilities and 
influence to further your views in this respect, if it 
was the wish of your people." The Governor advised 
a Mormon conquest of California, and the setting up 
of an independent government upon what was then 
Mexican soil. But Brigham Young and his confreres 
had already decided upon their course. The Mor- 
mon people were about to undertake another exodus, 
this time into an all but untrodden wilderness, thus 
fulfilling a prediction made by their Prophet in Aug- 
ust, 1842. Joseph Smith had then declared that the 
Latter-day Saints would be driven westward, and 
would "become a mighty people in the midst of the 
Rocky Mountains." 

It is nearly time to ring down the curt: in upon 
John Hay and his "Tragedy," — I had almost said 



94 ^*THE MOEMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY." 

travesty; for a more palpable burlesque upon his- 
torj^ was never palmed upon the public by an Ameri- 
can writer. Toward the murderers of the Prophet 
and the Patriarch he is generosity itself; but toward 
the victims of the cowardly and cruel massacre at 
Carthage, he shows not a spark of magnanimity, nor 
of common Christian charity. Yes, one ; he admits that 
^ ^ Joe Smith died bravely ; ' ' but he excuses the m_urder- 
ers of the heroic and innocent man, appreciates their 
characters, and all but approves their damnable deed. 
To him, as to them, this Prophet of God was evi- 
dently little better than a wild beast, worthy only to 
be hunted down and slain. Speaking of those who 
aspired to "the Prophet's mantle," he says, in con- 
cluding his article: 

V^The coolest and most unbelieving of them all 
succeeded to the autocracy. Brigham Young, 
whether guided by instinct or reason I do not know, 
avoided the fatal mistake of Smith, who turned back 
from Missouri to Illinois, and the crazy fantasy of 
Rigdon, who would have gone from Illinois to Penn- 
sylvania. Tribes and religions cannot travel against 
the sun. Young, during the troubled year that fol- 
lowed, exerted himself to gather all the reins of gov- 
ernment into his own hands; and there was not in 
all the slavish East a despot more absolute than he 
when at last he started, with his wives and his ser- 
vants and his cattle, to lead his people into the vast 
tolerant wilderness. ' ' 

Brigham Young's name and fame will survive 
all such aspersions upon his life and character. And 



iC 



THE MOllMON PROPHET 's TRAGEDY." 95 



as to the martyred founder of the faith which num- 
bered the great pioneer and state-builder among its 
sincerest behevers and most earnest advocates, a 
bigger and a better man than the author of the 
''Tragedy" of the "Mormon Prophet," has recorded 
imperishably, from a non-Mormon point of view, his 
impressions of Joseph the Seer; recorded them not 
from hearsay and tradition, but from personal con- 
tact and communion with the one whom he describes; 
recorded them in words that will breathe and burn 
when all that John Hay ever wrote is mouldering 
dust-covered in the limbo of forgetfulness. I refer 
to Josiah Quincy, and the following remarkable fore- 
cast from his philosophic and prophetic pen. 

JOSIAH QUINCY ON JOSEPH SMITH. 

"It is by no means improbable that some fu- 
ture text-book, for the use of generations yet un- 
born, will contain a question something like this: 
What historical American of the nineteenth century 
has exerted the most powerful influence upon the 
destinies of his countrymen? And it is by no means 
impossible that the answer to that interrogatory may 
thus be written: Joseph Smith, the Mormon Proph- 
et. And the reply, absurd as it doubtless seems to 
most men now living, may be an obvious common- 
place to their descendants. History deals in sur- 
prises and paradoxes quite as startling as this. The 
man who established a religion in this age of free 
debate, who was and is to day accepted by hundreds 
of thousands as a direct emissary from the Most 



96 **THE MORMON PROPHET's TRAGEDY." 

High, — such a rare human being is not to be disposed 
of by pelting his memory with unsavory epithets. 
Fanatic, imposter, charlatan, he may have been; but 
these hard names furnish no solution to the problem 
he presents to us. Fanatics and imposters are living 
and dying every da}', and their memory is buried 
with them; but the wonderful influence which this 
founder of a religion exerted and still exerts throws 
him into relief before us, not as a rogue to be crim- 
inated, but as a phenomenon to be explained. * * 

' ' The most vital questions Americans are asking 
each other today have to do with this man and what 
he has left us. A generation other than mine must 
deal with these questions. Burning questions they 
are, which must give a prominent place in the history 
of the country to that sturdy self-asserter whom I 
visited at Nauvoo. Joseph Smith, claiming to be an 
inspired teacher, faced adversity such as few men 
have been called to meet, enjoyed a brief season of 
prosperity such as few men have ever attained, anl, 
finally, forty- three days after I saw him, went cheer- 
fully to a martyr's death." 

As a fitting close to this review, I present this 
splendid portrait of the Prophet, drawn by the 
master mind and hand of Parley P. Pratt, one of 
his early friends and associates : 

PARLEY p. PRATT'S DESCRIPTION OF THE PROPHET. 

'* President Joseph Smith was in person tall and 
well built, strong and active; of a light complexion, 
light hair, blue e^^es, very little beard, and of an ex- 



"the mokmon prophet's tragedy." 97 

pression peculiar to himself, on which the eye 
naturally rested with interest, and was never weary 
of beholding. His countenance was ever mild, 
affable, beaming with intelligence and benevolence; 
mingled with a look of interest and an unconscious 
smile, or cheerfulness, and entirely free from all re- 
straint or affectation of gravity: and there was some- 
thing connected with the serene and steady penetrat- 
ing glance of his eye, as if he would probe the deep- 
est abyss of the human heart, gaze into eternity, pen- 
etrate the heavens, and comprehend all worlds. 

**He possessed a noble boldness and independ- 
ence of character; his manner was easy and familiar; 
his rebuke terrible as the lion; his benevolence un- 
bounded as the ocean; his intelligence universal, and 
his language abounding in original eloquence peculiar 
to himself —not polished — not studied — not smoothed 
and softened by education and refined by art; but 
flowing forth in its own native simplicity, and pro- 
fusely abounding in variety of subject and manner. 
He interested and edified, while, at the same time, he 
amused and entertained his audience; and none list- 
ened to him that were ever weary with his discourse. 
I have even known him to retain a congregation of 
willing and anxious listeners for many hours to- 
gether, in the midst of cold or sunshine, rain or wind, 
while they were laughing at one moment and weep- 
ing the next. Even his most bitter enemies were 
generally overcome, if he could once get their ears. 

**I have known him, when chained and sur- 
rounded with armed murderei's and assassins who 



98 "the mokmon peophet's tsagedy.'' 

were heaping upon him every possible insult and 
abuse, to rise up in the majesty of a son of God and 
rebuke them in the name of Jesus Christ, till they 
quailed before him, dropped their weapons, and on 
their knees begged his pardon, and ceased their 
abuse. 

"In short, in him the characters of a Daniel and 
a Cyrus were wonderfully blended. The gifts, wisdom 
and devotion of a Daniel were united with the bold- 
ness, courage, temperance, perseverance and gene- 
rosity of a Cyrus. And had he been spared a 
martj^'s fate till mature manhood and age, he was 
certainly endued with powers and ability to have 
revolutionized the world in many respects, and to 
have transmitted to posterity a name associated with 
more brilliant and glorious acts than has yet fallen to 
the lot of mortal. As it is, his works will live to end- 
less ages, and unnumbered millions yet unborn will 
mention his name with honor, as a noble instrument 
in the hands of God, who, during his short and youth- 
ful career, laid the foundation of that kingdom spoken 
of by Daniel, the prophet, which should break in 
pieces all other kingdoms and stand forever. '^ 



i^tU'nR 



"The Mormon 
Prophet's Tragedy" 



A Review of an article by the late John 
Hay, published originally in the Atlantic 
Monthly for December, i86g, and repub- 
lished in the Saints Herald of Juneai, 1905 



THE RBVieWBR 



<iAwr 



Orson F. Whitney 

Author of 

Whitney's History of Utah, and Assistant His- 
torian of the Church of Jesus Christ 
of Latter-day Saints. 



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